Post Grave
by Aussie
Summary: COMPLETE. Prequel to War Cries. Starts off immediately after Season 6. Willow goes to the coven to get help, but their intentions aren't what they seem. The Watchers Council's resources come under attack. Faith breaks out of Prison. The End Begins
1. Previously

Prelude  
  
  
  
  
  
What's happened previously:  
(Season 6 of Buffy)  
  
Willow, Xander, Anya and Tara perform a spell to raise Buffy from the dead, thinking that her soul has gone to any one of a number of hell dimensions. After Buffy comes back, she appears to be detached from the world, and she reveals to Spike (a vampire that can't hurt humans without a massive, instant headache due to a microchip in his brain) that she thinks that she was in heaven, not hell, and that she is now in hell (in the real world) because she was torn out of heaven. Buffy says that her friends can never know. Meanwhile, a trio of nerds (Warren, Jonathan and Andrew) team up to take over Sunnydale in their [twisted] way to get women and power. They know that the Slayer is a problem and set out to test her for weak spots. Willow and Tara's relationship comes under pressure as Tara starts to think that Willow is using too much magick. They have a fight about it, and both of them feel awful (as they hardly ever fight.) Willow uses magick and erases the memory of the fight from Tara's brain.   
  
When a demon comes to town, he makes everyone in the town sing and dance. It is revealed through the characters involuntary singing that Buffy is 'going through the motions' of life. Tara finds out about the Spell that Willow cast on her, and Buffy's friends find out that they ripped her from heaven. Spike and Buffy kiss, in a twisted sense of something (I don't know what, but it's just not right).  
  
Tara reveals that she knows that Willow cast the spell on her. Willow agrees to go one week without magick, but she does a spell to erase the memory's of everyone over the last week or so, so that Tara won't be mad at her, and Buffy won't remember she was in heaven. The spell goes awry and everyone forgets who they are, and they form weird ideas about who they were. The spell is ended, and Tara knows that Willow cast the spell. She leaves Willow. They both still love each other with all their souls, but Tara leaves knowing that Willow will have to stop using so much magick for there even to be a chance for Tara to return to her life. Giles says that he is returning back to England as Buffy needs to grow up and learn to be an adult and survive in the real world.   
  
Willow, depressed about Tara's leaving, turns the Rat, Amy (A witch that was going to be burned at the stake from the parents of Sunnydale who went insane for a day, and who turned herself into a rat to escape). Willow 'de-rats' her, and they go out partying with magick. Amy introduces Willow to Rack, who is a very powerful warlock, and who makes his customers 'high' with magick (his price is to 'take a little tour' of the recipient's body with magick (Nothing to do with sex)). Willow is addicted to magick, and while out with Dawn and running away from a demon, crashes the car, almost killing Dawn. Buffy is extremely pissed, and Willow vows that she has to get over her magick addiction. Meanwhile, Buffy is sleeping with spike 'just to feel'. Spike is in love with Buffy, but Buffy hates spike. Xander and Anya announce that they are going to get married.   
  
The nerds continue to experiment with their technology, and Warren 'accidentally' kills his ex girlfriend. They use their knowledge of technology and magicks to convince Buffy that she killed her. Willow is still suffering the effects of withdrawal from her magicks. It is revealed that Spike can hurt Buffy, and only Buffy without his chip hurting him. Buffy asks Tara to search and find if there is anything wrong with Buffy after coming back from the dead. Tara reveals that Buffy's molecular structure has been modified, but there is nothing wrong with her, but Buffy insists that there has to be something wrong with her because she is sleeping with Spike. Up until that point, Buffy had blamed the whole 'sleeping with Spike' deal to her being wrong from coming back from the dead.   
  
Buffy has a birthday, and Dawn (Buffy's sister) is feeling that she is being left out, and that Buffy would rather be dead than alive, with her. Unknowingly, she wishes that everyone would be around her and not rather be somewhere else, and a vengeance demon called Halfreck grants the wish, and at Buffy's birthday party, no one can leave the house. Tara and Willow talk, and things are starting to look up for them. They have no magickal supplies in the house, after getting rid of them all for Willow to get out of her magick addiction. It is revealed that Willow kept some basic things, just in case a situation happened at the house and they needed magick to survive. She gives these supplies to Tara, and Tara tries a spell to get them to be able to leave the house, but fails. Anya insists that Willow must do the spell to get them out, as Willow is much more powerful, but Willow refuses. Tara reveals that she is proud of Willow for refusing! They end up finding out about everything, and leave the house.   
  
Buffy's ex boyfriend (Riley) turns up in town, with his wife! They are a part of a commando unit that is hunting a demon that breeds and that has come to Sunnydale. After working together, they find out that the person harbouring the demon's eggs is Spike. Riley's wife says to Willow that she knew a couple of shamans that got addicted to magick, and that it is a proud achievement to come down from it. Buffy stops sleeping with Spike after Riley and his wife leave, saying that she doesn't love him, and that sleeping with him is 'killing' her, on the inside of course.   
  
Xander and Anya's wedding comes around, and someone claiming to be Xander from the future reveals what their marriage 'could' be like. In this future, Xander has a bad back and can't work. He somehow got the bad back from protecting Buffy, who died again. Xander is just like his father (an alcoholic, and abusive, with words, to his wife). Anya says that she hates herself, and has slept with a demon. Anya and Xander have two kids, one of which is not Xander's, but a demons. Xander, shocked by the visions, decides that he can not hurt Anya that much, and leaves Anya at the altar. Anya is devastated. Willow and Tara are starting to get along more.   
  
A demon hits Buffy, and her mind is pulled from one reality to the other. In another reality, she is just a girl in a mental institution, who has been there for the last six years after creating this world (the actual world the tv show is in), and creating an intricate network of friends (Willow, Xander etc. Basically, the world is everything that's happened over the last 6 years of the TV show). In this other world, her mother is still alive, and still married to her father. Her mother, father, and the doctor convince Buffy that to stop being sick, and to be able to go home with her family, she needs to sever her links with the other world (Her friends). Saying to herself 'what's more believable, a girl in a mental institution, or some kind of supergirl that fights monsters', Buffy, ties her friends up, and almost lets a demon kill them. In the mental institution world, Buffy says goodbye to her mum and dad, and she slips into her own little world, never to return again. Back in the Sunnydale world, Buffy's friends are saved by Tara! The episode actually doesn't give a definite answer on what the real world is, and the episode is done so well, that you are left wondering wether the show's past six years is just a crazy dream by some girl in a mental institution.  
  
Willow and Tara agree to go out for coffee! Xander is still looking for Anya, who has disappeared, but she comes back, a vengeance demon again. (She looks for women hurt by men, and grants them wishes on what they could do to the men). She tries to wish her will upon Xander, but Halfreck (the other demon like her) reveals that she must get someone else to wish bad for Xander, as she can't do it herself. She sets out, trying to get the Scooby gang to do this, but with no success. It is revealed that the Trio of nerds are up to something big, and that Jonathan might get left out (although he doesn't know it yet). In a moment of pain and drunkenness, Anya and Xander sleep together. While Willow is trying to track the Trio's signals of a camera, she finds a camera that the Trio have put in the Magic Box (shop), and the images are displayed on screen. Xander, Buffy, Willow and Dawn see Anya and Spike practically 'doing it' on the camera. Xander goes off and tries to kill Spike. It is revealed to Xander and Anya that Spike was sleeping with Buffy. Meanwhile, Tara turns up in Willow's room saying something along the lines of....  
  
"We can't just have coffee. There's trust to be rebuilt. We don't even know if we're the same people any more. It's going to take a long time... can we just skip it. Can you just be kissing me now" Right at the end, Willow and Tara make up!  
The next episode, shows Willow and Tara in bed, naked (Sheets covering nakedness), and it can be seen that they've officially made up. Meanwhile, the trio executes a part of their plan. They steal two orbs, which make one of them invulnerable and have super human strength. This is Warren. After spending most of the day in bed, Willow and Tara help out Buffy track the trio down. It is revealed that Willow and Tara are extremely happy to be back together again! Buffy stops Warren's plans, but he gets away with a jetpack? Andrew (another one of the trio) also has a jetpack, but Jonathan doesn't, revealing that they were planning on betraying him. Both of them go to jail while Warren is still at large. Xander forgives Buffy for sleeping with Spike (he is totally disgusted at the whole idea). As they are hugging, Warren turns up with a gun and shoots at Buffy and Xander. Buffy pushes Xander out of the way and gets shot herself. While running away, Warren lets off a couple more shots. (somewhere in there, Spike tries to Rape Buffy, saying that she wants to feel, but doesn't want to admit it)  
  
In Willow and Tara's bedroom, Willow and Tara have just gotten dressed. Then, all of a sudden, a red mark appears on Tara's chest, and blood is sprayed all over Willow's shirt. Tara says in confusion "Your shirt?" and collapses onto the floor. Willow is crying while calling Tara's name while holding her head on the floor.   
  
All hell breaks loose from here. After being weeks without magick, Willow invokes Osiris, and tries to make him bring Tara back. But because Tara was killed by human hands, it can not be done. (I think Willow looses it and actually hurts the god. A stream of energy is seen exiting her mouth as she shouts "no" and it hit's the image of Osiris, and he disappears screaming).   
  
Out in the backyard, the paramedics take Buffy away. As Xander is accompyaning them out to the ambulance, a cold Willow emerges from the front of the house. She coldly asks what's happened, and Xander replies, distraught, that Warren came with a gun. Willow just mutters 'Warren' and storms off into the distance.   
  
At the Magic Box, Willow appears. Her pupils have expanded to the size of her eyes (indicating in the show, heavy use of magick) when she opens the door, all the lights burst. Anya, because she's a vengeance demon senses Willow's pain, and tries to stop her, but Willow 'freezes' her in place. She drags all the 'black arts' books off the shelves and onto the table, and literally sucks them dry (text can be seen scrolling up her body). As she does this, her hair turns jet black.   
  
Dawn returns home and breaks down after finding Tara's body. (Next to Buffy, Tara was the only one who 'acted' as her 'mother')   
  
Xander is watching the surgery on Buffy. The lights start to flicker, and Willow turns up in the surgery room. She demands that the doctors leave. (somehow, Willow managed to clothe herself in black leather now) Xander notices this, but doesn't say anything, more distraught that Willow will kill Buffy by demanding that the doctors leave. Using magick, Willow levitates the bullet out of Buffy, and heals her wound. Buffy immediately notices Willow's change, but Willow demands that they go and find Warren.   
  
Warren finds out that he didn't kill Buffy, just only wounded her. He goes to Rack's place and pays him, and asks for protection from the Slayer. Rack says that the Slayer is the least of his problems, and that he should be more afraid of Willow. Warren asks for protection and cover.   
  
In the car, Xander isn't driving fast enough, and Willow uses magick to make the car go faster. They are in the desert now. Willow magickally drives the car through the desert to another highway, where she stops a bus right in front of her. Buffy and Xander can't understand her outrage, thinking that Buffy should be more pissed off than Willow as Buffy was on the receiving end of the Bullet. Warren gets out of the bus, and Willow immediately crushes his windpipe with her hands, but it is revealed that it was an android (That rack must have put magick on as Willow could sense Warren's essence on the robot). The conversation that takes place between Xander, Willow and Buffy goes something along these lines...  
  
Willow: It's a robot... I could feel his essence... he tricked me...I'll find him another way  
Buffy: And then what?  
Willow: (Coldly) and then we'll kill him.  
Buffy: Alright, you need to calm down!  
Willow: Calm down?  
Buffy: look, you're angry. I-I am too. There's no excuse for what Warren did...  
Willow: He shot Tara. When he shot you, he hit her too... upstairs in my bedroom... Guess the last shot was the charm.  
Xander: She's dead?  
Willow: She's dead, and now he's dead too  
Buffy: Oh my god... (whisper) Tara  
Xander: Christ Will. why didn't you say anything.  
Willow: I'm busy.  
  
They talk about them not killing Humans, and that it isn't the way. Willow says that she's not doing things Buffy's way and she uses magick to push Buffy and Xander to the ground. When they look up, she's gone.   
  
Chaos ensures. Buffy and Xander go to the Magic Box to try and find a locater spell to find Willow. It is revealed that Anya is a vengeance demon again, and that she can sense Willow's presence. They go off after Willow.   
  
In the woods at night time, Warren runs from Willow. He tries everything he's got. From sticking an axe into her back, to using a flying exploding robot bird. Nothing stops Willow. She uses magick to make vines tie him up. It is revealed that even though Warren is desperate for a date, he hates women. Willow gets the bullet that was in Buffy, and using magick, slowly moves it around the insides of Warren's body. She magickally stitches his mouth together. After having her fun, and after hearing that Buffy, Xander and Anya are coming, she utters two words "Bored Now" (These words were said by her vampire alter ego in Season 3). Xander, Buffy and Anya just arrive in time to see Willow quickly peel Warren's skin off with magick and fling it away. (It was done so fast, that I firstly thought that Willow had ripped his shirt off with magick, but then after looking back down at the body, realised that it was his skin). Buffy says "What did you do?" Willow says "One down," and disappears in a magickal cloud of mist and lightning.   
  
Anya reveals that the method Willow used to move around looks fancy, and is slower than teleporting and she teleports to the Jail where Andrew and Jonathan are. Buffy tells Xander to meet him at the jail, and runs off dodging things that only a slayer could. Xander is pissed off because he is the only one with a strong bond with Willow, but he doesn't have super powers so he can't do anything. Willow turns up outside the jail, and uses magick to start taking the bricks out of the wall that is in between her and Jonathan and Andrew. Buffy turns up, sneaks inside the jail and frees them both. Xander shows up in a police car and drives them off. Willow flies through the hole she made, and sees the bent bars, realising that Buffy freed them.   
  
Xander, Buffy, Jonathan and Andrew are driving in the police car, and Jonathan says that he didn't believe that that was Willow, and that he had known Willow almost as long as Buffy had, and that she was the smart, straight A student who packed her own lunches, and that he doesn't get why Willow doesn't just wave her arms and make them dead. Buffy reveals that Willow doesn't want them dead, but that she wants to kill them. Then, they are rammed from behind by a Mack truck, which Willow is controlling from the top of it. She runs out of power, and Buffy, Xander, Jonathan and Andrew escape.   
  
Willow turns up at Racks, and Rack treats her like she was a child and has just blossomed into a woman. He doesn't know the extent of her power. He asks her what she wants, and Willow responds 'Just want to take a little tour' and she drains Rack of his power, making her more powerful and, according to Anya, the most powerful Witch in the Western World.   
  
Meanwhile, Dawn decides to go to Rack's to see if he knows where Willow is, but she turns up there finding an insane Willow (from the power flowing through her now, and as well as from grief and pain over Tara's death). Willow voices her opinion to dawn that everyone will be glad that she's gone because of the constant whining. Willow starts to turn Dawn back into the key (A mystical ball of energy (Have to see season 5 to understand)). Buffy turns up, and one of the best speeches of the season occurs (in my opinion. It emphasises how much Willow and Tara loved each other)...  
Willow: Let me tell you something about Willow. She's a looser. People picked on her in Junior High, right through high school, up until college, with her stupid mousey ways. And now.... Willow's a junkie....... The only thing that I had going for me were the moments... just moments.. when Tara would look at me and I was wonderful.... And now that will never happen again!"  
  
Buffy tries to convince Willow to stop, and tries to tell Willow that the world is a place worth living in. But Willow sees through the lies and says to Buffy that she knows Buffy hates it there as much as Willow does. As this is occurring, the background is shifting and spinning. It is done so subtly, that I didn't notice until the camera zoomed out. They are now in the Magic Box with everyone else, and Willow says that the trip can be rough if they weren't, well, her. Buffy and Dawn collapse onto the ground. She sees Jonathan and Andrew, and tries to kill them with Magick, but there is a spell protecting them (which is being done by Anya) She says that although she can't hurt them with Magick, she can still cast spells on herself, and she makes herself extremely strong! She moves to beat them to death, but Buffy gets in the way and Willow hits her across the room. Buffy gets back up, and Hits Willow back. By this time, it is clear that it is not 'Willow' that they are dealing with. Willow makes a big speech on how she's been the 'sideman' for six years, and now she gets to be the Slayer, and how Buffy really needs to 'have every square inch of her butt kicked'. Buffy and Willow fight, in what can only be one of the best fights in the season, but Willow wins. While this was happening, Dawn, Xander, Andrew and Jonathan escape. She starts to say 'Well now there's no one in the world powerful enough to stop me,' When she is flung across the room with an 'energy ball' and Giles appears saying "I'd like to test that theory"! Willow sits up and says 'Oh, look, Daddy's home' and by the way she says it is absolutely clear that it is not 'Willow' She tries to get up, but Giles sends her to the floor again. She gets up, and this time block's Giles attempt to get her to stay on the floor. Giles binds Willow and her powers in a binding field.   
  
Andrew holds a sword to Xander's neck, saying that he isn't going to take orders from him. Jonathan holds a sword to Andrew's neck, saying that after this was over they were going to go back to jail and serve their sentence.   
  
Buffy and Giles are in the back room of the Magic box, talking about things that have happened. Giles says that an extremely powerful coven in Devon sensed a great magickal power rising in Sunnydale powered by grief, and the see-er in the coven saw Tara's death. The coven imbued their powers on Giles, and he came. After Buffy tells Giles exactly what's happened while he was gone, he bursts out in a fit of laughter [not believing that things could have gotten that bad, and at the possibility of Buffy sleeping with Spike]. Willow had made Anya (with aggressive telepathy) release her from the binding field, and she strikes out at Giles. Giles sends her through the wall. Giles enters back into the shop, where Willow is just getting up. The following speech goes somewhere along these lines.   
  
Willow: You don't get it do ya Geeves. You aren't going to defeat me. I could stand to go another ten rounds... While you can hardly stand at all.   
  
She waves her hand across her face and all her injuries disappear. Buffy saves Giles from falling debris that Willow made fall. Willow picks up fire and makes it into a ball of fire (How a network television program can afford to do all these special effects, I have no idea) and throws it up into the sky. She tells them that it's going to seek out Andrew and Jonathan and it will kill whoever's with them. Buffy runs after it, trying to save Xander and Dawn.   
  
They see the ball coming, and narrowly escape. Buffy falls into a tunnel that was under where the ball of fire hit, and then just later, Dawn does too. Xander is unconscious and Andrew and Jonathan run off.   
  
Back in the Magic Box, Willow is giving a big speech to Giles. The camera moves up to see Giles beaten, but 'lying' on the ceiling. Willow lets him fall to the ground before flinging him back up. Giles makes green energy come out of his mouth and it hits Willow (I think it was meant to be powerful) Willow stumbles and Giles falls to the floor. Willow says "That was...... rude!" Willow absorbs Giles's power and she falls onto the floor from the extremity of it. She says that no mortal person has ever had so much power, and she says that she can 'feel' everyone's pain. She gets up and says that she must make the pain stop.   
  
Xander regains consciousness, but he can't help Buffy or Dawn out of the pit. Anya teleports into the pit and tells them of what happened in the Magic Box. She says that Giles says that no natural or supernatural force can stop Willow and that she's gone to King Man's bluff to a temple to end the world. There is no temple on King Man's bluff, but Willow is raising it from the under the ground. Anya teleports back to the Magic Box to be with Giles as she thinks he doesn't have much time left. Giles reveals that Willow is going to drain the power of the earth and send it to the image of a satanic god, which will melt the earth's crust!  
  
On King man's bluff, Willow senses Buffy trying to get out to go and stop her. She says to Buffy through telepathy that she doesn't have the time to fight Buffy, but she deserves to go out Fighting, and Willow makes animated corpses out of the Earth around Buffy and Dawn. Buffy says to Dawn that she can't fight them all alone, and gives Dawn the sword (finally trusting Dawn to be at least a bit 'grown up')  
  
Willow starts draining the earth's energy, and she is sending it towards the temple, when Xander stands in the way of the energy and the temple (the effects, I don't know). Willow demands that he gets out of the way, and Xander says that Willow is his best friend (they've known each other since kindergarten). He says that if he is going to die, he wants it to be with her. He reveals a story about their first day of preschool when Willow broke the yellow crayon and cried because she was afraid to tell anyone. Xander says that he loves the 'crayon breaking willow' and the 'scary-end-of the world Willow. Willow demands that he gets out of the way, and strikes him down with magick. Xander gets up again, and Willow makes three cuts across his chest. Xander approaches Willow. Willow, still full of rage tries to strike out at him with Magick again, but it doesn't work . Xander tells Willow that he still loves her, and Willow tries to Strike him down again. Xander gets close and puts his hands on Willow's shoulders, and Willow starts hitting his chest, but to no avail. She is crying, but still with Rage in her voice. She collapses onto the ground, crying, with Xander holding her. Slowly, her hair turns back to red, and Xander and Willow are on the top of the hill, Xander still holding her, Willow still crying.   
  
Meanwhile, it is revealed that Dawn has some moves of her own. She says 'you think I've never watched you' to Buffy. They fight, side by side, and the demons disappear. Buffy breaks down crying, and Dawn thinks it's because Buffy didn't die (That she wanted to go back to heaven more than be with her) but Buffy reveals that she wants to stick around and see the person that dawn is to become, and that she's been trying to hide Dawn from the world, instead of show it to her. Giles is alright, and he says to Anya that Xander 'saved the world'  
  
Meanwhile, in all that confusion, Spike leaves Sunnydale and makes his way to Africa, to see a demon that will get his chip out. He says 'give me what I want. Give me what I want so I can give the Slayer what she deserves. The demon doesn't take spike's chip out, but instead gives him his soul (which will make him able to tell the difference from Right and wrong, and actually care about things)   
  
(Please note, that from when Warren, Andrew and Jonathan got their orbs that made Warren powerful, to the end, is only 4 episodes) 


	2. Chapter 1

Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.  
  
Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)  
  
Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)  
  
Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older).   
  
Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well.   
  
Note: This was done in MS Word and is in book format. For some reason, Fanfiction.net is not picking up the single line 'enters' (ie, a new line for when a person speaks). In Word Format, it is so, but on FF.net, there is no new line.   
  
  
  
  
  
Chapter 1  
  
  
  
  
  
  
And now, the conclusion…  
  
Buffy and Dawn walked through the graveyard. Buffy was so happy to be alive now. She had seen that Dawn could take care of herself, and it was at that moment that she realised that she had been sheltering Dawn from the world. Buffy realised that she desperately didn't want to do that, and that she wanted to show Dawn the world instead. As they had come out of the pit, Buffy had seen one of the most beautiful sunrises she had ever seen. She could only remember one other one, and that was when she saw the sun rising above the horizon just before she leapt into the blue, swirling energy mass to save the world. She could never forget that sunrise. It had been one of the last things she had seen before she died. At that same instant, she remembered Anya telling them about Giles.   
"Giles! We have to go and see if he's okay," Buffy said urgently to Dawn. She was thankful that the cemetery wasn't too far away from the Magic Box. She grabbed Dawn's hand and they started to run towards it. As she was running, she wondered where Xander had gone to, but she quickly realised that he had heard that Anya said that Willow was unstoppable, and that he had gone to the Magic Box to spend his last moments on earth with Giles and the woman he loved.   
When Buffy and Dawn reached the Magic Box, they found that it was ruined. Buffy couldn't imagine what had happened there while she was gone. Her heart skipped a beat as she realised that Giles and Anya might still be inside. Buffy started to head towards it at a quickened pace.   
"Buffy. Over there," Dawn said to her. Buffy looked in the direction that Dawn was looking at and saw Anya helping Giles sit down on a bench. She ran as fast as she could to the only father figure she had had in her life over the last six years.   
"Giles!" Buffy called out. "Is he going to be okay?"   
"I-I think so. It looks like he's going to be okay," Anya replied, obviously distressed.   
"Where's Xander?" Dawn asked urgently. Buffy realised that her younger sister must have thought the same thing that she did.   
"H-he's not here. He's up on King Man's Bluff. With Willow," Anya replied. Buffy's eyes went wide. She had just made up with Xander, and she wasn't going to loose him now.   
"Come on, we've got to go and get him!" Buffy shouted urgently while almost picking Giles up.   
"He's alright," Giles managed to say. "He saved us."   
"He saved us?" Buffy asked.   
"His love for Willow got through to something. He stopped her," Giles replied.  
"We've got to get up there," Dawn said, putting emphasis on got. Buffy and Dawn helped Giles along, while Anya walked beside them.   
  
The first thing Buffy saw was a giant obelisk type structure jutting out from the top of the hill. After gawking at if for a moment, she saw a dark shape on the ground. As they got closer, she realised that the shape was Xander, who was kneeling on the ground holding Willow.   
"Anya? Can you help Giles?" Buffy asked while looking at her. She didn't reply, but instead came over, put his arm around her shoulders, and helped him along. Buffy ran towards Xander and Willow as fast as she could. She slowed down as she approached the pair. Xander was holding onto Willow for dear life while staring at the ground in front of him. Willow was weeping furiously into Xander's stomach.   
  
Xander saw Buffy looking at them both, and he knew that what was to come might turn pretty ugly. He thought that it might as well be over and done with. Willow had settled down a bit now. She wasn't crying as much, but he could tell that she was still extremely upset.   
"Come on Will. We've got to get up," Xander said softly to her. He helped her up. When they were standing, he saw Willow look to Buffy, and then past her to Dawn, Giles and Anya who were slowly approaching. Xander was shocked as Willow turned around and clung to him.   
"I can't face them," she whispered into his ear. Xander now noticed that Willow was trembling as he held her.  
"You'll have to some day," Xander said to her.   
  
Willow looked up at Xander's eyes, pleading that he will not make her face Buffy. She knew that she couldn't look at her right now. Willow also knew that if she had to face Buffy, she would have to face Dawn, Giles and Anya. She couldn't do that. Her gaze was met with a determination and a realisation that she had never seen in Xander before. It was at that moment that she knew what she had to do. Slowly, she turned around to face Buffy, and took a quick glance up at her, but then looked down at the ground again. From the top of her vision, she could see Buffy coming towards her.   
"This is it. Here it comes. Buffy's going to hit me," Willow thought. She braced herself for the blow, but it never came. Instead, she found Buffy hugging her. Willow just stood there and began to cry again. She couldn't bring herself to hug Buffy back.   
"Get away from me," Willow said to Buffy, her voice trembling.   
"What?" Buffy asked, stunned.   
"I said, get away from me," Willow said again, this time louder. Buffy broke the hug and took a small step away. Giles was at her side now.   
"Willow," he said. The sympathy was evident in his voice. "I'm sorry you had to go through…"   
"Get Away!" Willow screamed. "Get Away! Get Away! Get Away!" she screamed at the top of her lungs, her voice threaded with rage. Buffy took a step closer to her, but Giles held her back.   
"She still has that power inside her. We'd better do as she wishes," he said to her, and everyone else. Slowly, everyone backed away from Willow, even Xander. Willow's insides were churning themselves up.   
"Will…" Buffy started.   
"I-I don't deserve this," Willow said, cutting Buffy off. She could feel everyone's gazes ripping her apart with their sympathy for her. "I-I don't deserve any of this… I'm a killer. I don't deserve your forgiveness," Willow said coldly and detached. Her body seemed to go into a mind of it's own as Willow backed away towards the temple. Then, before she knew it, she had turned around and was running towards the cliff.   
  
Buffy watched as Willow started to run away from them as fast as she could. Her gut cringed as she realised she was going to resume her ritual to drain the energies from the earth.   
"She's going to jump," Dawn said urgently. Buffy then realised that it was true. Willow wasn't running for the temple. She was going to run past it and jump off the cliffs. Before she knew it, Buffy was running as fast as she could towards the redhead. She didn't think that she had run so fast in her life. All that mattered was getting Willow back. Buffy had just realised how much she herself cherished life, and she wasn't going to let her best friend kill herself. Buffy reached Willow just in time and she grabbed the back of the witch's leather jacket and pulled as hard as she could. Willow went flying past Buffy and crashed onto the ground. Buffy was now standing between Willow and the cliff. Buffy spun around and saw Willow sitting up on her elbows looking at her.   
"You're not going to kill yourself," Buffy said. "I'm not going to let you."   
"Why?" Willow asked. It was obvious to Buffy that in Willow's mind she was already dead.   
"There's so much to live for," Buffy said. This time, she meant it.   
"There's nothing to live for," Willow replied, the authority firm in her voice. "The only thing I had to live for was taken away. And now… I need to be with her," Willow said. Buffy could see that she was about to break down again.   
"You lived without Tara before," Buffy pointed out. There was a long silence as Willow looked at Buffy. It was obvious to Buffy that she was missing something.   
"The only thing that kept me going was knowing that Tara would come back some day," Willow said to Buffy while looking straight at, and through, her. Buffy looked at Willow, and she had no idea what to do.   
"Willow. You can't kill yourself… you just cant. I know that things are bad now, but they'll get better. I mean it. They'll get better. It might take a couple of months, or a couple of years, but it'll get better," Buffy said, almost pleading to Willow. Buffy saw someone stand next to her, and then someone else on the other side. She looked and saw that it was Giles and Xander. Now, all of them were standing between Willow and the cliff, and by the look in Giles and Xander's eyes, they were not going to let her through. She saw Dawn and Anya standing in front of them: behind Willow. She looked back to Willow. She saw her look at Xander, then Buffy, and then at Giles, only for the briefest second before she glanced away at the ground. Giles took a step forward and Willow scampered backwards. It was obvious to everyone that she didn't want to be anywhere near Giles. She slowly got up and looked at everyone. Buffy watched as she really looked at her, Giles and Xander. She was reading the looks in their eyes. Buffy looked into her eyes and she saw that they weren't Willow's eyes. Her eyes were usually full and vibrant, enjoying life. These eyes were dull, and it looked like they had a glaze over them, and that they were looking at something millions of miles away. Buffy observed Willow's face, and she saw the look of pain cross it. At the same time, she, Xander and Giles slowly moved towards her.   
"Why'd she have to die?" Willow said on the verge of tears. She was looking right at Giles now, and she broke down and the tears were freely flowing now. Willow's legs gave way and she fell to the ground. 


	3. Chapter 2

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Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.  
  
Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)  
  
Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)  
  
Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older).   
  
Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well.   
  
Note: This was done in MS Word and is in book format. For some reason, Fanfiction.net is not picking up the single line 'enters' (ie, a new line for when a person speaks). In Word Format, it is so, but on FF.net, there is no new line.   
______________________________________  
  
  
  
Chapter 2  
  
  
  
  
  
He lay on the ground, shivering and crying uncontrollably. He was in a large, dark cave, and there was something else inside. It watched over him as he dreamt of the things that he had done in his past.   
"You now have what you want vampire," it said in a cold and sinister tone. It watched as the metamorphosis began on the vampire, changing it's appearance. It didn't know why that happened, it just knew that it happened. It walked out of the cave entrance and into the night. It was finally time for it to change it's location. There were too many that knew of his location now. It walked out and left the vampire to his dreams of the past. It was going to go underground now. It was already underground, but still, demons and people managed to find it. It was going to go deep into the Asian wilderness, and there, it would disappear.   
  
Buffy, Giles and Xander had helped Willow up after she had broken down. They escorted her down from the bluff. Giles knew that Willow 'really' didn't want to die. He knew that if she really wanted to die, that she would have used the magicks inside of her to kill herself instead of trying to jump off the cliff. He couldn't imagine the pain that Willow had gone through, both before and after she had absorbed his powers. He had never lost someone that was as close as Tara was to Willow. He had come close when Angelus had killed Jenny Calender, but he didn't love her as much as Willow loved Tara. He couldn't believe how out of hand the Scooby Gang had let things get in his absence, but he was sure that in time, everything would return to the closest thing to normal as one could get on the Hellmouth. He was still tired beyond description, but he persevered. Only when they had reached the bottom of the bluff did he let Anya help him. He was worried about Willow and what she would do over the next couple of weeks. He had an idea forming in the back of his mind, but he dismissed it and would think of it later, after he had recovered.   
"Come on Will. Let's take you home," Buffy gently said to her. Willow looked up from the ground at her.   
"I-I don't want to go there," she replied. "Too many memories."   
"Where are you going to go?" Dawn asked.   
"I'll take her home. I've got a spare room. She can stay there," Xander said. Willow looked up at him and nodded. Giles watched as they walked down the sidewalk. Willow had her arms crossed over her chest and constantly looked at the ground. He knew that it was going to be extremely hard for her to recover, and that she might never again be the Willow that they all knew.  
"Do you have a place to stay?" Buffy asked Giles, knowing that he had rented out his apartment when he left Sunnydale.   
"N-no. I teleported in," Giles replied to her.   
"Okay, you can stay at our place," Buffy said while moving to help Giles. As they walked across town, Giles reflected on the events of the past, and for the first time he saw how something like this could happen. He remembered thinking about Willow's uses of magicks in the summer, and how they could get dangerous, but he had dismissed it knowing that Willow was a responsible and reasonable person who wouldn't hurt a fly. The thought had never crossed his mind that Tara would die, and set off Willow. He vowed to never again dismiss any thoughts he had about any of the Scoobies. All he needed to do now was to rest.   
  
They arrived at the Summers' residence at eleven in the morning after taking all morning to walk across town with Giles. Buffy showed him up to the guest bedroom, which was no longer being used by Willow and Tara, and he had collapsed onto the bed. Buffy then came downstairs and Anya had asked her if she could stay for a while because she was concerned for Giles. Buffy just nodded and Anya disappeared somewhere in the house, probably to talk to Dawn. Buffy just collapsed onto the couch, exhausted. Her mind replayed the events of the last year, and she couldn't believe how out of hand things had become. They had drastically misjudged 'The Trio' as they called themselves. Buffy thought that they were incapable of doing any damage to her or her friends, but one of them had shot her and Tara. Now, one of the Trio was dead, and the other two were missing. Buffy didn't want to misjudge Andrew and Jonathan, even though they seemed pathetic enough. She laughed out loud as the thoughts came racing back to her mind about what the doctor had said when Buffy was in her two states of mind: that she was no longer facing vampires, demons, and gods, but ordinary people.   
As she thought about it, she felt a slight tingling sensation on the back of her neck, signalling that there were vampires nearby. Buffy jumped up and looked around the living room, and there was no one there. She crept into the kitchen, arms raised, ready to attack, only to see Dawn and Anya standing at the island in the middle of the kitchen. Dawn and Anya looked up at her.   
"Buffy, what's wrong?" Dawn asked.   
"There are vampires nearby," Buffy said. She didn't even bother to look outside, as it was daytime. She crept through the kitchen and made her way into the dining room. There was nothing there either. Buffy made her way upstairs and checked all of the rooms, and once again, nothing. She returned to the kitchen and looked at Dawn and Anya. Then, the tingling sensation on the back of her neck disappeared as abruptly as it had started. "Everything's fine," Buffy told them. She went back and collapsed onto the couch and let her mind wander.   
  
He awoke with a start. The dreams he had just had were horrible and gruesome. Usually, he didn't mind those sorts of things, but this time it was different. They were his memories. He was dreaming about the things he had done over the last centaury, and it chilled him to the bone. His insides were churned up, and didn't know what to do. He couldn't describe with words how bad he felt. He tried to push the memories into the back of his head and think about something else, but it was impossible. They just kept coming and there was nothing he could do to stop it. He hugged his knees to his chest and rocked back and forward, muttering something so fast it was impossible to recognise as language. Then, the realisation hit him, and the memory of the demon returned to him. He remembered the last couple of words that the demon said.   
"Then I will return, your soul," Spike muttered under his breath. He repeated it over and over again while rocking back and forth, his mind not able to grasp what had happened to him. The words had no meaning to him, yet.   
  
After Xander had taken Willow to his apartment, he showed her the guest room and she went inside, closed the door and locked it. Xander knew that she wanted to be alone, and that he probably wouldn't see her for quite a while. He collapsed on the couch and just thought about how bad things had become. He was happy that he had made up with Buffy, but deep down inside him, he was still overwhelmingly ashamed that he had stood by and done nothing as Warren raised the gun. If only he hadn't froze for those few seconds, Tara might still be alive, and they would probably be kicking Warren, Jonathan and Andrew's asses right now. His thoughts turned to Willow again. He heard her crying from the other room now, and he knew that Willow had been through so much. He would have to keep an eye on her, as he knew that they hadn't done enough to convince her not to kill herself. Willow was his closest friend, and he was in no way going to let her kill herself. If Willow died, he didn't know what to do. He knew that Buffy would become detached again, and that Giles would leave back for England, and that left him with no one. He knew that things between him and Anya weren't going to be alright. Anya was still devastated that Xander had left her at the altar. The demon had shown him what their marriage could turn out like, and Xander fled. After the demon had shown him the visions, he had never doubted that they were wrong, until he was told that it was a demon that wanted to hurt Anya. Still, he thought, that their marriage had a chance to turn out that way, and Xander could never hurt Anya that much. He wasn't sure what Anya would do now that she was a vengeance demon again. He doubted that she would stay in Sunnydale for long. Right now, it looked like the only thing that was keeping her here was the shop, which was now ruined from the fight between Giles, Buffy and Willow; and Giles. So much depended on what Giles was going to do right now, and Xander was glad that he was back. He let out a long sigh and fell asleep on the couch.   
  
After she had become accustomed to her new environment, she had watched the events that had happened in the world. She had watched the ones she loved go through more than she could ever stand. She knew what it was like there. There was only one thing that she loved there, and that person had destroyed themselves. Now, there was nothing to hold her attention in the real world, and she let the warmth wash over her, and go through her. Here, nothing could go wrong, because there was nothing that could be right. Here, she was herself and no one could, or would, judge her. Here, she was now perfectly happy. 


	4. Chapter 3

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FanFiction.net is having troubles with showing HTML files (Which I have uploaded chapter 3 and 4 as so there is a new line). That is why it says that there is a whole heap of chapters, but only one and two are viewable. This is a text document, and I'm not sure wether the new line thing will work.  
  
  
Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.  
  
Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)  
  
Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)  
  
Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older).   
  
Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well.   
  
Note: This was done in MS Word and is in book format. For some reason, Fanfiction.net is not picking up the single line 'enters' (ie, a new line for when a person speaks). In Word Format, it is so, but on FF.net, there is sometimes no new line.   
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Chapter 3  
  
  
  
Buffy, Giles, Xander, Willow, Dawn, and even Anya had all rested and lounged about for something close to three days. Giles had used the time to recover from his fight with Willow, as well as think about some things he needed to do. From what Buffy could observe, he was always on the phone to someone back in England. Dawn didn't need too much time to recover from the shock of it all, and she was actively participating in life. Buffy had spent most of the time sleeping, or thinking about the situation with Willow and what they could do with her. Anya used the time to seriously consider things between herself and Xander, and wether she saw a future in it or not. There was something about Xander saving the world through his friendship with Willow that Anya admired. Towards the third day, she had realised that even though she was a demon again, she wanted that kind of friendship with someone, and that the only two people she knew well enough were Xander and Giles.  
  
Xander woke up on the air mattress again. He had let Willow have his, and formerly Anya's room for the double bed while he slept on the air mattress in the spare room. He looked across at the clock he had placed next to his temporary bed, and he saw that it was almost time to go to the Magic Box, for a meeting Giles had called. They were going to discuss Willow's situation. Giles had told Xander to try and get her to come, but it wasn't necessary for her to be there. He got up and changed into something that would look at least a bit respectable and walked out into the main room. He walked across to his bedroom and tapped quietly on the door.   
"Willow?" he asked. "Can I come in?" Xander didn't hear any response, and he was worried for the redhead. He hadn't seen her surface from the room for the whole period she had been staying at his apartment. He slowly opened the door and had a look inside. He saw Willow curled up in a ball, hugging her legs, while lying on the bed. He moved around so he could see her face. His heart skipped a beat as he looked at her. She was staring at the wall, her eyes bloodshot with dark circles under them. He could see that she had recently been crying as the tears were still wet on her face. Her red hair was covering half of her face. He looked at her, and he could see how skinny she had become in three days. He moved over and put his hand on her cheek. He saw her eyes shift up and look at him. "God Willow. To be honest, you look terrible. You need to drink, and eat, something," he said while stroking his thumb along her cheek. He was only met by a blank stare. "Promise me that you'll eat something while I'm gone," Xander said. Willow just stared at him again. He could see fresh tears forming in her eyes.   
"Gone?" she asked almost silently.   
"Yeah. You know... that meeting I told you Giles was holding... You wanna come?" Xander said to her. Willow just shook her head from side to side slowly. "Okay... Just eat something while I'm away. Promise?" Xander asked. Willow slightly nodded her head, and Xander kissed her on the forehead, turned around and left the room. As he was closing the door, he heard Willow start to cry again.   
  
Willow lay in bed, she was crying again now. Everything that had happened over the last week caught up to her; again. She wept about Tara's death. She wept about trying to kill all of her friends, and she wept because they were still there for her. She didn't know what she had done to deserve their comfort. It tore her up inside that they were all being so supportive to her, especially Xander. She still felt where he had touched her on her face, and she tried to rub it off with her hand. She didn't deserve their love, and she desperately wanted to be with Tara again.   
  
Everyone was sitting around, the Summers' lounge room, the mood sombre. They were all waiting for Giles to come down before they started to do any serious talking. Anya, Dawn and Buffy were on the couch while Xander was standing. Eventually, Giles came down from the second story of their house, and they got started.   
"How is she?" Giles said as soon as he saw Xander.   
"I don't know," he replied.   
"What do you mean you don't know?" Giles asked calmly.   
"There's not a word that I know of to describe her," Xander replied. Before anyone could interrupt he continued. " I only saw her just before I left to come here. She hasn't eaten or had anything to drink in three days, and she'll hardly speak. She's skin and bones... a-and I think she's crying most of the day, and night too," he explained. There was a short silence as everyone stared at him, not believing what he was saying. "And in my opinion, scary-veiny Willow looked better than skinny-super depressed Willow." There was yet more silence. Everyone felt awkward as they didn't know what to do.  
"I'm going back to England," Giles said after an eternity. Everyone turned and glared at him. "And I'm taking Willow with me," he added in. He was met by confused looks all around.   
"Why?" Dawn asked. Giles took off his glasses and produced a cloth out of his pocket. He began to clean his glasses while explaining.   
"I-I believe that the coven in Devon, who imbued me with their powers, may be able to help her, both with the magicks a-and the grieving process," Giles explained.   
"I think that she needs to be with her friends," both Dawn and Buffy said. "We're virtually her family. If anyone can help, we can," Buffy said. Giles looked at Buffy for a while, and then at Dawn, and then at Xander, and finally Anya.   
"I don't believe that's the case... you saw on King Man's Bluff how Willow tried to kill herself, because we were too caring to her, and she believed she didn't deserve that... I think she needs time away from here, and from people she knows," Giles said. It was obvious to everyone that Giles had done a lot of thinking about this. There was another long silence as everyone thought about what would happen to Willow, and how things would be around Sunnydale without her. "But that's not the main reason I called this meeting," Giles said. Xander, Dawn and Anya all got confused looks on their faces. Only Buffy knew what Giles was going to say next.   
"What else is there to talk about?" Anya asked.   
"O-Over the last couple of days, I regret, that I've had to arrange Tara's funeral... I-It's tomorrow, at midday... Tomorrow night, I'm taking Willow," Giles almost whispered. Xander felt his heart cringe at the thought of Tara. She was the only person who didn't judge anyone, and who kept an open mind, and who was always down to earth. He remembered the moments when he had seen Willow and Tara together, and both of them seemed to glow. He remembered when he had first met Tara, and how she was a shy witch that could hardly look anyone in the eye. He then remembered the Tara of the year that had gone by. She was confident and proud.   
"It isn't fair," he muttered under his breath. "No one like her deserves to die," he said louder this time. "How is it that the best people end up dying?" Xander said while shaking his head. "I'm sorry, but I'm outta here. I'll tell Willow about everything. I don't know if she'll listen or not, but I'll tell her," Xander said. "I'll see you all tomorrow." He turned around and walked out the door.   
  
Buffy knew exactly what Xander meant before he had left. She didn't know why the best people had to die. Tara was one of the best people she had known: Buffy was pretty sure that Tara and her mother were the best people she had known. Buffy remembered that they both were always there, supporting everyone around them. They were the rocks of Buffy's life. Recently, Tara had been there to support Buffy and her 'relationship' with Spike. What Buffy remembered was that Tara wasn't disgusted because she didn't judge Buffy for doing that, and she didn't judge Spike either. Buffy realised that she could never let this happen again. She knew exactly what she needed to do, but now was not the right time. It would never be the right time for a while.   
  
Xander walked into his apartment, very depressed. He looked around, and was pleased to see the bathroom light on and the door slightly ajar. That meant that Willow had gotten up, which was a good thing. He approached the door, and he didn't hear any running water, so Willow couldn't be having a shower. He tapped on the door with his knuckles.   
"Willow?" he asked. "You in there? I'm giving you five seconds to get a towel, and then I'm coming in," Xander said. He waited ten seconds, and then walked into the bathroom.. He saw Willow, sitting on the ground with her legs curled to the side, and her back to him. He saw her holding something, and he walked closer. Xander could see Willow's left hand side, and he saw that Willow's right hand was trembling, and that she was holding something. He walked closer, and he saw and saw that Willow blood on Willow's right arm, which was dripping onto her left arm, which was below it. had slashed one of her wrists, with a razor that she was holding. At first, his brain didn't register what he was seeing, and then, when it did, he was sure that his heart stopped. "Willow? What are you doing?"   
  
  
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This has gotten a little dark, and the next chapter will probably be the darkest, with Tara's funeral and all. But things are going to pick up, and a plot will eventually be wound into the story! If you're a Willow fan, this is going to be heart wrenching stuff (i hope).  
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	5. Chapter 4

_________________________________________  
Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.  
  
Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)  
  
Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)  
  
Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older).   
  
Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well.   
  
Note: This was done in MS Word and is in book format. For some reason, Fanfiction.net is not picking up the single line 'enters' (ie, a new line for when a person speaks). In Word Format, it is so, but on FF.net, there is sometimes no new line.   
  
Chapter Summary and Author's Note: This is going to be a darkish one. And the whole thing is about Willow (Which the whole story might be. I'm not too sure yet. This is the first thing that I've written as I go along, so I don't know where it's going. Maybe, soon, there might be a plot introduced…. And before you ask, no, I haven't fogotten about Spike. He'll be featured in the same chapter as the one that Willow comes back from the Council in J (It needs to be done, for story line sakes.. you'll see)  
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Chapter 4  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Xander rushed down to Willow's side and grabbed the razor out of her hands before she could cut her other wrist. He panicked at seeing the wound across his best friend's wrist. He knew what to do, but he couldn't find the information inside his brain.   
"What do I do?" he asked her in a panic. "Of course. Stop the blood," he said to himself. He ran over to the cupboard and quickly had a look through it. He could only find a roll of toilet paper, so he grabbed that and wrapped it as tight as he could around Willow's wrist without breaking the toilet paper. His hands were shaking as he held Willow's hand. He looked into her eyes, and his heart broke at the sight. Xander's first impression was that Willow looked so innocent, that she looked like she needed just to be held by someone. He saw through it and got a first hand glimpse at her pain. "Giles! I have to call Giles! He'll know what to do!" Xander almost shouted, his voice trembling. He broke eye contact with Willow and raced to the phone. He hit the speed dial to Giles' place and waited. It was only a couple of seconds before the other line was picked up. "Giles! It's Willow!" he said distressed into the phone.   
"Who is this? I don't know any Giles," the voice answered on the other end. Xander then remembered that Giles wasn't there and that he'd rented his place out. Without saying another word, he slammed the phone down and hit another speed dial on the phone.   
"Yes?" he heard a familiar blonde voice answer. It was Buffy.  
"Buffy? I need to speak to Giles! Right now!" Xander said, his voice still trembling.   
"Hang on, I'll put him on," Buffy said, concern evident in her voice. Xander waited a second before Giles got the phone.   
"Xander? Yes? Wha…" he started.  
"Giles! It's Willow. I-I-I came home, and she had slit one of her wrists. I-I don't know what to do."  
"Uh-uh-uh, wrap it up in something. Make sure the blood's stopped flowing," Giles replied into the phone, becoming distressed himself.   
"I-I did that," Xander replied. "Just get over here!" He heard the other end go dead and he hung up the phone. It was only then that he noticed the pain in his left hand. He opened up his palm only to see that he had been grasping the razor blade ever since he had rushed out of the bathroom. There was deep cut across his fingers. There was a lot of blood pouring out from it. "Crap!" He raced back into the bathroom and wrapped his hand up in toilet paper. He looked to Willow. She held her face in her hands and was rocking back and forward while crying, again. Xander held her. "Willow. Don't do this to me, please. I can't loose you. You, Buffy and Giles are all I have left," he said softly to her, his voice trembling. He rocked back and forward with her, still holding her.   
"One tiny piece of metal ends it all," Willow said to Xander. He didn't understand what she was talking about. He held onto Willow tighter. "I just need her back," Willow muttered while the tears were streaming down her face. Xander didn't say anything and just held Willow for the time being, hoping that she was going to be alright. "I can't live without her."  
Everyone was in the car with Giles, except Anya. She had left the meeting soon after Xander, and no one knew where she was. Buffy could have sworn that she had never seen Giles drive as fast in his life. That might have had something to do with the fact that Giles had never had a car that could go as fast as her mother's four wheel drive could. She had instantly put on her seatbelt as they screeched around the corners. They had finally arrived at Xander's apartment, and Buffy saw Giles grab the first aid kit and run inside. Giles had never told them what had happened. He had only insisted that they needed to get to Xander's place as fast as they could. Buffy jumped out of the car and followed him. She ran through the hallway and saw Giles almost blow down Xander's door. She followed after him, aware that Dawn was right behind her. She saw Giles run into the bathroom, and she followed him again. She immediately stopped as she saw Xander holding onto the blood stained toilet paper around Willow's wrist. She noticed that he was holding onto her too, and that the pair were rocking back and forward. Buffy knew that Willow needed serious help. Although, earlier, she was against the notion of Giles taking Willow away, she knew that it needed to be done. She needed help beyond what the Scooby Gang and Sunnydale could provide for her. She saw Giles undress the crude wrapping that Xander had provided and properly wrap Willow's wrist up in bandages. Buffy moved in to help Willow up, and together she and Xander escorted her into the main room. They sat her down at a chair at the head of the table, and everyone sat down on either side. Although to Xander and Giles Willow appeared still, Buffy noticed that her body was still trembling ever so slightly.   
"Willow, there's some things we need to tell you," Giles started. Buffy saw Willow's blank eyes look to Giles first, and then to Buffy, Xander and then finally Dawn. Buffy was happy that Willow would at least look at Giles now. Buffy's eyes met Giles's and she saw that he needed support. Nodded at him, signalling that he might as well tell Willow about tomorrow now. "Tara's funeral is tomorrow at midday," Giles said.   
Buffy looked to Willow, who just kept staring at Giles with a blank expression on her face. Buffy knew that Willow would never shed any more tears unless she got some sleep. Her body just wasn't capable of it.   
"I-It's going to be a small service, in the graveyard, not in a morgue," Giles continued. There was a long silence as everyone looked to Willow for a reaction.   
"There's something more. Something you're not telling me," she said quietly and firmly to Giles.   
"Tomorrow afternoon, you're coming back to England with me… The coven in Devon has agreed to help you," Giles explained. Buffy just saw Willow nod in silent recognition.   
"How long will I be away?" Willow asked.   
"I don't know. It could be a week, it could be a month, it could be half a year," Giles replied. Willow only nodded again. "I'm so sorry for what you've had to go through… what you've lost," Giles said, empathy clear in his voice. Buffy could see that he was really looking at Willow now; looking through the blank void of her eyes and into her soul.   
"It doesn't matter. Nothing's going to change what's happened," Willow replied. she stared into space for what seemed like an eternity.   
"You're going to get through this," Buffy said to her. Willow's head turned to Buffy.   
"I know," she replied. Buffy reached out and held the top of Willow's hand in hers. It seemed like an eternity that they stayed in that position. Buffy was looking into Willow's eyes and she could see that they were just making futile attempts to make Willow feel better. Finally, the redhead got up. "I'm going to bed now," she said to them all before turning around and heading into Xander's room. Once the door closed, Buffy turned to the others.  
"She's not going to get better is she?" Buffy asked them all.   
"Of course she's going to get better," Giles said, trying to comfort Buffy.   
"No she isn't," Dawn said. Everyone turned to her, and deep down inside her, Buffy knew that she was right.   
  
Willow was sitting on a light pink and white checker coloured rug in the middle of a park that seemed to go on forever. The sun was shining brightly, and Willow could hear the birds singing. She was wearing a white, loose fitting dress that flowed down to her knees. She knew that the day was perfect as she placed the wrapped up sandwiches onto the rug. She looked at the large tree in front of her, and marvelled at it's beauty. A pair of warm hands moved under the neckline of her dress and started to rub her shoulders. Willow closed her eyes and leaned back into the body that was kneeling behind her.   
"Mmm, that feels good," Willow said out loud, to no one in particular. All the tension in her body seemed to ebb away into nothingness. When Willow thought about it, she didn't know what the tension was there for. There was nothing wrong in her life. Willow felt a nice cool breeze start to pick up and blow against her face. She moved out of reach of the warm hands that were massaging her shoulders and turned to face their owner. She saw her beautiful long blonde hair moving ever so slightly in the breeze. Willow gazed into her deep blue eyes and she was told a thousand stories, all about Willow. Willow watched her lover's mouth spread into a beautiful warm smile that was reserved only for her. In a sudden rush, Willow moved closer and gave her lover the most passionate kiss she had ever given. She put her arms around her lover, and she felt her lover's hands start caressing her back. Slowly, she was pulled forward so that she was on top of her, their kiss never breaking. Willow slipped her tongue into her soulmate's mouth. It was met by her tongue, and they engaged in a fierce contest. Willow could sense that something was wrong. She pulled her lips away from her soulmate, and saw that her face was cold and pale. She looked down at her chest and saw a large red pool of blood.   
"Tara! No!"   
Willow's eyes shot open as she woke. She had realised that it had only been a dream. Slowly, she rolled over to put her arms around her lover, but there was nothing there. She looked closer, and saw that the bed beside her hadn't been disturbed. Then, the memories of the last couple of days came crashing back to her and Willow's insides melted. She could do nothing to hold the tears back, and there was nothing that was going to stop her. She let out a loud sob, and then soon, another came, and another.   
  
Buffy looked around her, and suddenly things were dark. She realised that she must have fallen asleep on Xander's couch. They had all agreed to stay over at Xander's apartment in case anything else happened. Buffy was alerted by a horrible noise. She sprung up and looked around the apartment, but there was nothing there. She then realised where the noise was coming from: Willow's room. She walked over to the door and opened it. She could see easily by the moonlight that was streaming in through the windows. Willow was lying on the bed clutching a pillow to her chest while her body was slowly convulsing. Buffy could barely make out what Willow was moaning. It was 'no'. She had no idea what to do. She had no idea what she could do to comfort the Wiccan, so she gently closed the door and returned to the couch next to Dawn. She prayed that whatever Giles was going to do would help.   
  
They were now in the land where they would hopefully be safe. They looked around at their surroundings, clearly shocked. They didn't expect Mexico to be so… Mexican. They had nothing except what they carried with them, which wasn't a lot.   
"Do you think she'll come after us here?" Andrew asked Jonathan.   
"She'll come after us anywhere we go," Jonathan answered.   
"You're right. We're never going to escape that Sith-Witch," Andrew replied. "If only Luke Skywalker was here to save us. Or Warren." Jonathan just gave him a disgusted look. He couldn't believe he had agreed to Andrew's terms. At the time, they seemed promising, but now, sitting in a jail cell talking to himself seemed like a better idea. Jonathan just shook his head and started to walk through the streets of Tijuana, Mexico. They had managed to sneak past the border patrols easily enough. They knew they wouldn't get through because they didn't have passports.   
"Idiot," Jonathan said to him.   
  
Willow got out of the passenger's side of the car. She looked over to Xander who was walking around the car to her. She looked into the graveyard and she realised that it was the same one that Buffy and Dawn were in when they fell into the pit. She felt a cold sensation on her arm and looked at it. There was a drop of water there. She looked up to the sky and was strangely fascinated with the formation of the clouds: a big grey blanket that was uniform in colour and stretched for as far as the eye could see.   
"Weather fits the occasion," Xander said to her. She brought her gaze down and looked at him.   
"Yeah," Willow simply replied.   
"Come on, Giles is over there," Xander said while pointing to the entrance to the graveyard.   
"I'll be there soon. Don't want to go in there yet," Willow almost whispered to him.   
"Okay, but what are you going to do? Just stand here?" Xander asked. Willow just looked at him, aware that an answer was not necessary. Xander just looked at her, and then started to move away. She looked over to Giles and noticed that he was wearing a navy blue shirt with a black coat and navy blue long pants. She told herself to remember to thank him for arranging everything for her funeral. She looked into the cemetery and she tried not to think about what was happening today.   
  
She recited the words, and with all her effort, put meaning behind them as she felt the sorrow and grief from everyone around her. It was overwhelming to say the least. This person had been loved dearly in life, and now, she was dead. She had blocked out most of the feelings emanating from the group. She knew a bit about the deceased and the people around her. She knew that the blonde was the Vampire Slayer, and that the redhead that was putting out so much emotion was the deceased's lover. Slowly, she stood up and beckoned to the redhead. She hated doing this job, but as the leader of the local coven of Witches, she was called to do this. She watched as the redhead barely managed to hold a set of cards in front of her. The redhead started to speak, but only got one syllable out before she broke down and collapsed onto the ground.   
"I can't do this," she heard the red haired witch say. She saw the older man bend down and put his hand on her shoulder as he picked up the cards. He began to read them out loud.   
"Tara. When I first met you, you were so timid and withdrawn that I thought nothing would be able to bring you out. Immediately I saw the person that you were that you tried so hard to keep locked up inside. From the first moment our hands touched, I somehow knew that you were different. I always got so excited when it was time for us to get together and do some spells… and then, when we first kissed, I knew that you were the one for me. You became my life. Every moment that I was away from you depleted me somehow…" the older man started. The Coven leader looked down to Tara, and then to the redhead that was weeping on the ground and she couldn't help but cry as she listened to the rest of the speech that the redhead had prepared. "I knew that we were made for each other. We were connected in body, mind and soul. You said that you'd never leave me, but you did. You left me so that I could get better, and I did, for you. The best day of my life was the day when you came into my bedroom and said that you couldn't be away from me any more. At that time, I knew that my life would be alright. The only thing that kept me going for that time that you were away from me was knowing that we'd be together again. But now, you're gone. You were taken away from me, and I want you to know that I will never let you go. I'll never forget you, and you'll be with me, always."   
She looked around at the group of people gathered around the grave, and they were all weeping. She saw the redhead lean over and kiss the body of Tara. She waited until the redhead had stopped and had backed away from the casket before she signalled four men to put the top on and to lower it into the ground. As soon as the casket was being lowered, the heavens opened up and it poured rain. 


	6. Chapter 5

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Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.  
  
Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)  
  
Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)  
  
Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older).   
  
Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well.   
_______________________________________  
  
  
  
  
Chapter 5  
  
  
  
  
Willow stared out at the vast expanse of blue before her. It was so uniform. Her thoughts were a million miles away from where she was as she stared out the window. She sensed movement near her, but she didn't care. She remembered the looks on her friend's faces as she and Giles walked down the hallway to the entrance of the plane. She couldn't believe that they'd stuck beside her all this time, even after the things she had done. She heard a banging sound and looked towards it. The air hostess had put a meal on her tray. Willow just looked at it, and then turned back to the window. She was now resting her head on her hand while she thought. Food didn't even enter into her mind as a priority at the moment. Willow thought about the coven she was going to see, and what they would be like. She didn't know what they would do to her. She was thinking that they would treat her like a bomb, ready to explode, and not as a human being. No matter which way they treated her, Willow was certain that it wouldn't bother her in the slightest. Her thoughts turned to Giles, the man sitting next to her. She knew why he was taking her to England; because he cared, and he didn't want to see her, or any of the Scoobies hurt. Willow felt so bad for what she did to Giles. She couldn't believe that she had almost killed him. She felt worse about almost killing Giles than she did about killing Warren. Willow knew that she meant every single word that she had said to Warren. That he was a waste and didn't deserve to live because of what he's done. Deep down, inside her, Willow knew that she regretted killing him, but only a bit. Willow turned and looked at Giles, still thinking about him. She then realised that he was looking at her, and saying something.   
"What was that?" Willow asked timidly.   
"Food. There. You have to eat something," Giles said to her. Willow just looked at him, shrugged and turned back to the window. "Have you seen yourself in the mirror lately? You look a mess, and you're skin and bones. You need to eat something," Willow heard Giles say. Indifferent, Willow unwrapped the meal and began to eat. She had barely started before all the food was gone. She hadn't realised how hungry was.   
"You going to eat that?" Willow asked Giles with a mouthful of food while pointing to a bun on his meal tray. Giles shook his head, and immediately Willow grabbed it and stuffed it down.   
  
Giles hadn't seen such a display in his life. He watched, awe struck, as Willow digested everything in front of her, and in front of him within minutes.   
"Bloody hell...Willow, did you eat anything in Sunnydale?" he asked. He saw Willow shrug as she chewed the last of her food. Giles watched her, curious to see what happened. He was glad when Willow looked at him after her meal. Giles saw a very small sparkle of life in her eyes, something that she'd lost over the last couple of days. It churned him up inside as he saw the sparkle diminish and fade into nothingness, leaving a cold hard stare. Giles only smiled at Willow as she returned to staring out the window.   
  
The night was cool, and the air crisp. A light fog hung over the river. Under the bridge crossing the river there was a small group of figures huddled around a fire, soaking in the warmth. They were all dressed in rags. Surprisingly the mood was good as everyone laughed and joked. There was something in the bushes by the bridge, looking at them all. It began to move, just slightly. The vampire came out of the bushes and looked at the group of people. Beside him, another showed itself, and then over on the other side of the bridge, three more could be seen coming out from their hiding places. His brow protruded and his fangs elongated. His eyesight drastically improved as his pupils turned yellow. Slowly, he started down the slope. He could hear his comrade beside him, also doing the same. When he was a hundred feet from the group, he charged.   
"In the name of the master, die!" he yelled. The group turned to look at him, and then started to run the other way, but they were only met by more vampires. He charged into the group, killing as many people as he could, but not feeding. For the ritual to work, they needed a lot of blood.  
  
Willow was astounded by how large London actually was. She looked down on the city as they flew over it. She had managed to finally push all of her thoughts into the back of her mind, for now. Willow knew that she had to be careful about what she thought about. Anything could trigger off memories of the previous days. When they landed, Willow and Giles went to collect their baggage, and then they caught a train to Devon.   
  
The train trip was much like the plane trip. Willow was staring out the window while Giles worried about her. It only took two hours to get out to the Devon county, where they would then have to get Giles's car and drive out to his estate.   
  
Willow just stared out the window. Her eyes roaming the countryside while her brain was thousands of kilometres away. She thought about Sunnydale and the things that had happened after Tara's death. She remembered the feelings going through her, and the power. She had hurt so many people on her revenge trip, most of them the people she cared about. She didn't know how she would ever be able to go back to Sunnydale, let alone face her friends again. For the briefest second, her thoughts drifted back to Tara, and to Warren, who she had pleasure in killing. With tight restraint, Willow thought about anything other than that. She looked out at the countryside, and for the first time noticed how much farmland there was in England. The countryside before her was bland and hilly, with hardly any trees. She could see a town in the distance, and thought that that might be their final destination, but after looking at the clock at the head of the carriage, realised that they had only left London half an hour ago. Willow put her head back onto the seat and closed her eyes. She was so tempted to just delve into the power that was inside of her. Then, there would be no more worrying, no more thinking, and no more heart wrenching pain. The power would flow through her and take her feelings away. She could do whatever she wanted to do, except bring Tara back. It was so tempting, but she thought about all the innocent people around her, and Giles, and Buffy, and Xander, and Dawn, and even Anya. She knew that she couldn't put them through that again, especially Xander. She realised that his world had collapsed around him. First, it was Buffy coming back, and being detached. Then Giles left. He was the only father figure any of them had in their lives as Xander's father was a drunk, and Buffy's father was no where to be found, and Willow's father didn't care about what was going on in her life. Then, after that, it was the whole deal with the wedding, and him leaving Anya, and her becoming a vengeance demon again. Then, finally, the one thing that Xander had left of his old life, Willow, had gone on a power trip, and almost killed him. It was at that moment that Willow felt sorry for Xander. He had no one left.   
Willow's thoughts turned to Giles. She didn't know why he was helping her, but she guessed that it was because he cared. Willow had often looked up to Giles, for having all the answers. She briefly remembered her saying something about that in the Magic Box, when she was torturing Giles. Still, he remained with a level head, and still, he acted as the father of the Scooby Gang.   
Her thoughts now turned to Buffy. Willow finally had a brief knowledge of what Buffy had been through after coming back from the dead. When she was with Tara, Willow was in heaven, but she got that torn away from her. Now, Willow could easily relate to Buffy.   
Finally, her thoughts turned to herself. Who was she now? Without Tara in the world, Willow had nothing to work towards. There was no light at the end of the tunnel. Willow had lost her sense of self. She now knew what Tara had said to her during the whole incident when they all sung and danced. She remembered Tara's words exactly.   
"I know exactly what they see in me... You." Now, Willow felt that for herself. She knew that when she and Tara were together, the differences between both of them disappeared and they melted into each other, becoming one being. Tears formed in her eyes, but she desperately tried to hold them back. She wasn't going to burst out crying, not now. When she was in private she would let the tears flow, but not here, not now on the train. She turned her head and looked straight out the window so no one could see her face. She tried to blink back the tears, but they wouldn't stop coming, but instead they came harder. Willow couldn't stop the thoughts and images going through her head of Tara. She couldn't believe that she was gone, never to return to her. Out of control, her thoughts turned to what she had done after Tara's death. She thought about how Tara would feel about Willow's revenge trip, and she knew that Tara hate her for it. Willow wiped away the tears and searched for anything that she could see out the window to concentrate on. She looked at a cow, which looked up at the train and tilted it's head to the side while looking at it. It made Willow smile. She kept the image in her head and all of her other thoughts drifted away as she concentrated on the image. It kept her going for the rest of the trip.  
  
Spike awoke with a start. He sighed as he realised that it was only a dream. He was still in the cave. He walked around and found his shirt that he had discarded during the trials that he endured, supposedly to get the chip out of his head. Instead, he got a soul, and he didn't understand why. 


	7. Chapter 6

_________________________________________

Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.

Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)

Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)

Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older). 

Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well. 

_______________________________________

Chapter 6

Sam was sick of this prison already. Everything in this new prison was grey and bland. The floor and walls were concrete and even the prisoner's uniforms were grey. There was hardly a change in colour wherever he went. Sam had just finished getting his meal, after waiting for what could only be half an hour in the line. He looked around and saw a friend that he had made in the few days he had been here. He walked over to the table and sat across from it. He looked back to the line of prisoners that were queued and saw that it was remarkably long. He saw a dark haired girl push her way in and grab some food and then start to walk off.

"Who's that?" Sam asked his friend Graham.

"Who? Her?" Graham replied while nodding in the girl's direction.

"Yeah," Sam replied. 

"I think her name's Faith. Don't really know. She doesn't talk that much. The deal is that no one gets in her way, and she doesn't kill you," Graham replied. Sam tried to hold in a small burst of laughter. 

"What's she in for?" Sam asked.

"She confessed to killing the deputy mayor of Sunnydale," Graham replied. There was a short silence as both men watched the girl. 

"She can't just go and push in like that. I waited for half a bloody hour, and she waits for two seconds. Someone needs to talk to her," Sam said.

"Oh, well, fine, but she's the top dog around here. It's your funeral. When you're laying in your own pool of blood on the floor, I'm just going to come by and say I told you so," Graham replied. Graham could tell that Sam was intimidated by the girl, who looked small compared to him. Graham knew that Sam just wanted an excuse to make a reputation for himself, and the best way to do that was to show that he was better than Faith. Sam looked like a big bloke, but he had nothing compared to Faith, and Graham knew this. Sam got up and walked towards the girl. He stood in front of her, blocking the way. The girl tried to go around him, but Sam stopped her by moving his body so it was in the way. Sam looked down on the girl, amazed that someone so skinny and small could be at the top of the ladder around these parts.

"Get out of my way," she muttered to him. 

"You think that you can just barge in and take whatever you want?" Sam asked her in a hostile voice. He watched as the girl just turned away from him and started to walk away. He moved up behind her, put his hand on her shoulder and spun around. "No one walks away from me." He saw the girl just look up at him, and then turn to walk away again. Sam knew that his reasons for becoming hostile towards the girl were stupid, but he didn't see why this tiny little girl had all the power among the prisoners, and he wanted to take it from her by beating her up, therefore showing that he was better than her. "Don't turn your back to me," Sam said to her. He noticed that half the prisoners were watching the small confrontation now. He squeezed on the small dark haired girl's shoulder and stopped her from moving. 

"Mate, you're a dead man," the nearest person said to him. Before he knew what was happening, the girl had put her tray down on the nearest table and had slowly turned around to him.

"I'm telling you this once. You leave me alone and I won't have to kick your ass across the room," the girl said to him, more confidence in her voice. "I haven't been in a fight here in a really long time, and I'm looking forward to one. Either you let me go right now, or I get to party," the girl mocked. 

"I don't think so," Sam replied. The girl was extremely intimidating, and she obviously had a big mouth, and she was really pissing him off. He pulled his right hand back and punched towards the girl. To his amazement, he found his fist caught in her palm. 

"Fine then. Let's party," the girl said before throwing his fist away. He let the girl go with his left hand and punched towards the girl again. The girl just threw his punch away with her left arm, and before he knew it, she ducked down and delivered a viscous uppercut to his stomach. He could feel his breakfast starting to move up his stomach as he bent over. He stood up and saw the girl standing there side on to him, her right leg in front of her left with both her fists raised against her chest. He just had time to stand up straight before the girl sidestepped towards him and kicked him in the chest, sending him crashing to the table behind him. Sam felt a sharp pain in his back as it crashed into the side of the long bench. He stood up and held his left hand to his back which was now throbbing with pain. He saw the girl, Faith, striding towards him and she hit him in the stomach again. On reaction, be bent forward again, and from the top of his vision he saw the girl's elbow coming for the back of his head. Before he knew what hit him, his face was hurtling towards the ground. He felt his nose break as it hit the concrete. 

Graham got up and walked over to where Sam was now lying. He saw Faith walk away, pick up her tray and sit down and start to eat. He looked down at Sam, who had now managed to turn over onto his back. Graham could see that he had a broken nose as there was a huge lump on it, and there was blood gushing out of it. 

"I told ya so," he said while looking at Sam directly in the eye. 

Buffy walked alongside her sister in the cemetery, keeping an eye out for anything that needed slaying. Dawn had insisted on coming on patrol with Buffy tonight. The first reaction that Buffy had was to immediately say no, but then she remembered the pit and how Dawn had handled herself. She had changed her mind, and decided to let Dawn come along.

"You never said that it would be this cold," Dawn said to Buffy with her arms crossed trying to keep the warmth in. 

"Haven't you ever seen the movies? It's always cold in a cemetery at night time," Buffy replied. "Haven't I taught you. Always trust the movies." Dawn looked at her sister in confusion. 

"Oookay, yeah. So, there's really nothing called a Vampire Slayer and all the vampires can turn into bats?" Dawn said, mocking Buffy.

"Well… okay, don't trust the movies," Buffy replied. Buffy looked up at the stars and noticed that there was an extraordinary amount of them out tonight. She had never seen as many stars in her life. Three of them seemed to be moving, and twirling around each other. "That's weird." 

"What?" Dawn asked. 

"Those stars there. They're moving," Buffy pointed towards the stars. 

"You sure they're stars?" Dawn asked. "They could be satellites, or U.F.O's."

"Well, umm satellites don't move like that, and U.F.O's aren't real," Buffy replied. 

"Oh, but demons and vampires and all are?" Dawn said. Buffy looked at her sternly. 

"Yes. Yes they are," she replied while turning to look back at the stars. They moved back into their places and stayed there.

"Hey, they're part of the Big Squiggly Line," Dawn said. Buffy looked at her, her mouth slightly open. 

"Huh?" she asked in confusion. 

"The Big Squiggly Line. It's a star constellation," Dawn answered. 

"I don't think that's a star constellation," Buffy replied. "They usually have cool names like Taurus or The Saucepan or something." 

"It's Tara's constellation. She has her own names for them," Dawn said. Her voice dropped, "she showed it to me." Buffy just looked at Dawn for a long time.

"Oh," she simply answered. Buffy heard a stick snap near them and she snapped her head around and looked in the direction it had came from. She saw three figures walking towards them, checking the names of all the graves as they went. Buffy felt a slight tingling sensation on the back of her neck, signalling that they were vampires. "Dawn. Vampires, over there, three of them. Do you see?" 

"Yeah, I see them," Dawn replied. 

"Okay. I want you just to watch. Don't come and fight," Buffy said. 

"Yeah, I got you," Dawn replied, the disappointment evident in her voice. Buffy knew that Dawn wasn't ready to fight yet. She could handle herself, but not against a vampire. Buffy reached into her jacket pocket and gave a steak to Dawn. 

"If one of them comes near you, try to shove this through their heart. But only if they come near you!" Buffy explained to Dawn while giving her the steak. Dawn nodded her head. Buffy moved off towards the vampires and she could hear Dawn close behind her. When they were ten metres away from the vampires, Buffy signalled Dawn to wait there. She looked over her shoulder and saw Dawn stop and wait, the steak in her hand. Buffy continued towards the vampires, who now had their backs turned towards her. She put purpose into her stride and wasn't surprised when one turned around. She was surprised though when he said her name.

"Buffy," he said. The other two turned around now. 

"Slayer," another one of them said. They were all dressed in black, and they all had on long black dusters. 

"You know me, but I don't know you?" Buffy said. 

"That's not important," the first vampire replied. 

"Oh, I seem to think it is. I need to know your names before I kill you. It's called being polite," Buffy replied in a know-it-all voice.

"Our master will drink your blood once he rises Slayer," the second vampire said. 

"Sorry. Been there, done that. Boring now," Buffy replied while stepping forward and kicking the vampire. To her surprise, the kick hardly registered to him. 

"We are not going to do this now Slayer. We will not fight you," the middle vampire said. 

"Fine. Makes the killing easier," Buffy replied. she stepped forward and whipped a steak out of her jacket. With one quick, practiced movement she plunged it into the third vampire. He turned to dust before her. When Buffy turned around to face the other vampires but they were gone. Buffy looked around, but she couldn't see them anywhere. She walked back over to Dawn, obviously disappointed with the night's 'slayage'. 

"Is it usually like that?" Dawn asked. 

"Nope. Usually they're all little piles of dust by now," Buffy replied while putting her steak back into her jacket's pocket. They both patrolled for another hour, but didn't find anything. 

The elder had felt her presence long ago. She was powerful, very powerful. One of the most powerful of her kind. But he had a job to do, and nothing would deter him from that. He and his group would do whatever there was in their power to restrain the young girl. They didn't need her to unleash upon them, as they knew that they would be powerless to do anything. 

__

Willow lay on the red chequered rug that she had placed out before. She could feel Tara's hand in hers as they lay on their backs beside each other. It was nice lying here, with Tara. Willow was looking at the blonde witch as she stared up at the sky. 

"See, that one there. I think it looks like a little puppy," Tara said while pointing upwards. Willow looked up to where Tara's hand was pointing, but only saw a big white cloud. 

"Where?" Willow asked softly. 

"See, that one," Tara said. Willow saw the cloud that Tara was pointing at. 

"It doesn't look like a puppy," Willow replied. 

"Sure it does. See, there's the tail, there's it's legs, and there's it's head," Tara said while pointing to various parts of the cloud. 

"Oh. It does look like a puppy," Willow said, a grin on her face. "That's one fat puppy." Willow was often awe struck at how Tara saw things, and how she used her imagination. Willow turned her head back to watch Tara, who was concentrating on the clouds. 

"Oh my god! Willow! That one there, it looks like us, when we're…" Tara said. Willow didn't hear any of the words that Tara said. She was spellbound by her lover. "Willow… Willow…," she briefly heard. _The voice started to fade and in its place, another came._

"Willow… Willow… Wake up. We're here," she heard. She opened her eyes only to see Giles looking down at her. 

"Huh?" she asked sleepily. "Giles? What are you doing here? Where am I?" 

"We're in the Exmoor Forrest, at the Coven," Giles replied. Willow looked around and saw that she was in Giles' car. 

"Oh," she sighed. It had only been a dream. She saw Giles getting out of the car, and she soon followed. When she got out, the cold struck her and she crossed her arms over her chest. She looked around at her surroundings, awe struck. Around her there were giant trees, some of them pine trees, some were some kind of other tree. The ground was littered with leaves, and the air was cold and moist. To Willow, it looked like something out of a fantasy movie. "Wow," she said while looking around her. She saw a dirt path that led off into the forest. Giles was walking towards it, and Willow followed him, her arms still crossed. All doubts in her mind about the coven vanished as she was thrilled to be in a place like this.

"It's not a far walk to the main homestead," Giles said. 

"Homestead?" Willow asked. 

"Yes. Most of the coven lives here in the forest. Depending on what is to happen, we might be staying with them for a while," Giles said to her. 

"Oh," Willow replied, fear clear in her voice. She didn't want to be the centre of attention, and she didn't want people looking at her like she was some sort of monster. They knew what she was capable of, as they were the ones that directed Giles back to Sunnydale. Suddenly, Willow felt a great sense of dread inside her. She said nothing, and only walked behind Giles, knowing that what she was doing was necessary.

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So, tell me what ya think… any plot suggestions would be great, although I already have one in my head, but could use a couple of different things. More to happen next chapter!


	8. Chapter 7

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Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and Co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.

Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)

Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)

Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older). 

Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well. 

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Chapter 7

Spike made his way out of the cave. He felt a lot different, like he could do anything. He was lost in his thoughts as he made it to the entrance. He walked towards it, where the sunlight was streaming through, but he didn't notice. It was only when he stepped out into it that he noticed the sunlight was there. 

"Crap!" he screamed, but the sunlight didn't burn him. "What the bleedin 'ell?" he muttered to himself as he was bathed in sunlight. He looked down on his body and noticed that his skin was intact. He stood there for a few more moments, basking in the warmth of the sunlight. Then, it began to burn him and he ducked back into the darkness of the cave. "What the 'ell is 'appenin' to me," he said through his clenched teeth, fury evident in his voice. He put his hand out into the sunlight, and it tingled for a while before it started to burn his skin. He kept his hand there, trying to see what would happen. His teeth were clenched because of the pain. He wasn't surprised when his hand started to smoke, signalling that it would soon burst into fire. He pulled his hand back and held it against his shirt. He knew that usually when a vampire was exposed to the sunlight for only a few seconds they would burst into flames, but he seemed able to last a in the sunlight for a couple of minutes. "Just what I need." 

After a lot of coaxing from Buffy, Xander and Dawn, Anya had agreed to go back to the Magic Box and assess the damages. They all accompanied her to the shop that had slowly became their home away from home over the last two years. Xander was pleased that Anya was starting to at least talk to him in an orderly fashion again. He was hoping that things might return to the way they were before they tried to get married, but deep in the back of his mind, Xander knew that Anya was a demon now. The thought of going out with a demon still gave him the creeps. He had put it down to the whole incident when he had a crush on the teacher and she turned out to be a giant grasshopper. 

They just arrived at the shop, and even from the outside you could see the damages. Xander slowly opened the door and went inside, followed by Buffy, and then Anya. Dawn insisted that she wouldn't go inside unless Anya went first, so that way, they would get Anya into the shop. 

"Oh my god," Buffy said. "What happened here after I left?" 

"Willow and Giles fought," Anya replied while looking around in horror at her shop. "Look at this place. I'll never afford to get it fixed." Xander knew that this was coming. He put his hand on Anya's shoulder. 

"I can get the construction crew in here, and we can do it for a reduced cost," he said to her softly.

"Really?" Anya asked, hope in her voice. 

"Yeah. I'll do as much of the work as I can by myself, and I'll get the boys to help out now and then," Xander replied. 

"Ohh," Anya said while rushing forward and hugging him. Xander didn't know what to do, he didn't expect this reaction from Anya. He hugged her back, and looked at Buffy and Dawn who were smiling at them. Anya broke away from the hug and looked at Xander. "This isn't going to make up for what you've done Xander," she said to him. Xander tried to hide it, but he knew that there was disappointment and hurt riddled throughout his eyes. He kept looking at Anya. "But it's a start," she added in. Xander couldn't believe what he had just heard. Anya had been nice to him and had started to forgive him for what he had done. 

"Thankyou," he whispered to her. Then, louder, he said, "We'll start in the morning." Anya smiled at him before turning around and looking around the store once again. 

"Find what isn't damaged and put it over there," Anya said while pointing towards the door. No one moved. "Come on! Move it. The more things we can salvage, the less money I have to spend." 

"Sheesh, it's not like we work for you or anything," Dawn said. 

"You do little missy," Anya said while pointing her finger at Dawn. Xander knew that Dawn still hadn't worked off her debt to Anya for stealing things from the Magic Box, and he also knew that she would never work off her debt until Anya was finished with her. He started searching through the wreckage, looking for anything that was intact or that looked like it could be fixed easily, but his thoughts were thousands of kilometres away. He was thinking about the small chance that he and Anya would get back together again. 

He saw two figures walking down along the path, down the hill. He had been told to wait here until their guests arrived, and he was guessing that these two people coming now were them. Michael had been told of what happened in America, and he didn't believe it. He recognised the first figure now as Rupert Giles. Behind him, he saw a rather petite girl walking with her arms crossed over her chest while looking down at the ground. He seriously doubted that this girl was the one that they had told him about. Michael thought that she might be the girl's friend, who had come in her place to say why the witch wasn't coming. He remembered that the girl had a strange name, the name of a tree, but he couldn't remember which. 

"Rupert Giles?" he said to him while he was approaching. He knew that it was him, but he needed confirmation. 

"Yes," Giles replied. 

"Who is this you have with you here?" Michael asked. 

"This is Willow Rosenberg. I was meant to bring her here," Giles replied. Michael was clearly shocked, and for a second thought that Giles was kidding. This small girl in front of her couldn't possibly have so much power inside of her. He saw her look up, and when he gazed into her eyes, he could see the pain and despair inside of them, and he knew that this was the girl he was told about. 

"This way please. The High Priest and Priestess are waiting to see you both," Michael said while leading the way. 

Willow looked at the man that was guiding them towards the small village that belonged to the coven. Apparently, according to Giles, there were others that lived in the small village other than coven members. Upon hearing about the coven, they had flocked towards them, and the coven had set up a village for them to live in. The other people were mostly solitary witches that were interested in observing the coven and how it worked. Apparently, every now and then, the whole village would partake in rituals. Willow noticed the surprise on the man's face when Giles had said that she was Willow. Obviously, he had been told what had happened and expected more. The scenery was still breathtaking, but now they were in the middle of the forest, untouched by the modern world. Willow saw that there were a couple of log buildings up ahead and guessed that it was the Coven's village. She liked the look of the place, and wondered how much time she would get to herself here. Willow was unbelievably cold as she walked through the forest. 

They made their way through the village, and Willow saw everyone look at her as she walked. It was obvious that they all knew who she was. She hugged herself tighter and looked down at the ground. She finally knew how Tara felt when they had first met each other in college, and now Willow understood why Tara often crossed her arms around herself. It made her feel secure. Willow could feel everyone's gazes ripping her apart with their looks and judgements, and she didn't like it one bit. This was the treatment that she was afraid she'd receive. 

She sat in one of the chairs at the end of the cabin, which was just one big room that took up the whole inside of the cabin. The room had been previously arranged for the rituals that needed to be held here. There were chairs lining the walls, and two chairs in front of her, reserved for their guests. She could feel them outside now. The power coming off of the girl was extraordinary. Even though she had stopped using it, the power was deep down inside her, ready to come out. That was their main goal, to get their own power back that they had given to the Watcher to stop the girl, and to help the girl recover from her loss and to try and control the power she herself had inside her. With her permission, the coven was going to try and tap into her power and determine its origin. They couldn't tell if the girl's soul was mainly good, or bad, and since this girl's power came from mostly inside of her, they needed to determine her intents. Samantha knew that the girl had fought by the side of the Slayer for six years, but that didn't determine who she was. Deep down inside her, there was either a certain desire to do help, or to destroy. It was buried so deep within a person, that most of the time, it would not show itself in a lifetime, and the person was free to do what they wanted. 

Samantha could feel her just outside the door now. She could tell that the girl was extremely uncomfortable here, and that she didn't like everyone around her judging her. The door opened, and Michael walked in, followed by Giles, and then followed by Willow. Beside Samantha sat Montague, the high priest to the coven. She could tell that he also sensed the girl's power. 

Willow looked at the two people sitting in the chairs at the end of the cabin. At first, they both seemed quite young for High Priests, but as she got closer, she could see that they were in their mid sixties. She liked the High Priestess straight away as she was greeted with a warm smile from her. The High Priest on the other hand kept his expression blank as she and Giles moved towards the two. By now, Willow was almost shivering uncontrollably. 

"What's wrong young one?" The High Priestess asked Willow. 

"I'm cold," she felt herself weakly reply. 

"Of course, you come from a warm part of the world," the High Priestess said. It was as cold inside the cabin as it was outside. Even though Willow was wearing her grey jumper and jeans, she was still cold. 

"Come, we'll move over to the fire place," the High Priest said while pointing his hand behind Willow and Giles. She didn't even know that there was a fire place until he had pointed to it. Willow quickly walked next to it and put her hands out to it, the warmth bathing over her and warming her up. She looked back over her shoulder and saw the High Priest and the High Priestess talking to Giles. She didn't know where the man that had led them here had gone. 

Michael walked away from the cabin to where his two friends were standing. He looked to James and then to Clifford as they waited for him. Clifford was tall, with short black hair and blue eyes. He wasn't fat, but he wasn't skinny either. James was the shortest of the trio, with light green eyes and flowing blonde hair. 

"Was that her? The redhead?" James asked. 

"Yes, it was," Michael replied. 

"She's cute," Clifford said. 

"Yeah, but remember, she's gay," James said. 

"Ohh, all the good ones have to be gay or married," Clifford said, forced disappointment in his voice. 

"Anyway, if she wasn't gay, I don't think she'd be interested. She looks so sad," Michael said. 

"You've got to feel sorry for the poor girl though," James said. 

"Yeah, you do," Clifford agreed. 

"She's come here to recover. I don't think she'll be showing her face around for a while," Michael said. "She'll be spending a lot of time with the High Priest and Priestess.

"I wonder if they coven'll be able to get her recuperated. By the looks of things, it'll be hard work," James said. 

"They'll get it done. They get everything done," Clifford said, utter loyalty to the coven. 

As Giles and the High Priestess talked, Montague, the High Priest looked at the young girl before them. He couldn't believe that this was actually the girl that Moragan, the seer of the coven, had seen in her vision. His eyes lost focus and his pupils expanded as he looked at the girl. He could see the girl's usually white Aura dulled to a grey, with black streaks through it, signifying her pain. Montague snapped back into focus as they started to move towards the girl. 

Willow sat down in the nearest chair to the fire. Giles sat next to her, while the High Priestess and the High Priest sat opposite them. Willow was glad that they were near the fire. She wouldn't have to concentrate on being cold, but she could concentrate on some other things. Willow looked around the room. It was huge, about ten metres wide and twenty metres in length. There were a couple of large windows on each wall, and Willow noticed that they were all open. There was a large oval shaped Persian rug on the floor in the middle of the room, and chairs lined the two longest walls. The walls, ceiling and roof were all made of pine logs that Willow could only guess were cut down at this very place. She turned to the High Priest and Priestess as one of them spoke to her. 

"Penny for your thoughts?" the High Priest asked. 

"I was just thinking of how big this room is," Willow replied weakly, never looking in his eyes. 

"It is quite impressive isn't it?" the High Priestess said. Willow only nodded her head. There was an awkward silence between everyone. "Willow. I like that name. It's soft and gentle," the High Priestess said. 

"Thanks…" Willow replied.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I'm Samantha, and this is Montague," the High Priestess said. Willow only nodded her head as another awkward silence passed between them. The silence was going to kill her if nothing else did. 

"Tell me Willow. Why are you here?" Montague asked her gently. 

"Because Giles brought me here," Willow replied. 

"That's not the reason. You want to be here don't you? If you didn't, you wouldn't have come with Giles," Montague said to her. 

"I guess," Willow said. She had no idea why she was here, other than Giles said that he was bringing her here because they could help her. 

"You need to want to be here before we can help you Willow," Samantha said. Willow closed her eyes and looked deep down inside her. She realised that she didn't want to abuse her magicks again, so then she couldn't hurt anyone like she hurt Tara. She realised how much it hurt Tara to leave her because she was abusing magick. She knew that whatever they did, they would not be able to get her natural talents out of her, because that was a part of her. She opened her eyes and was instantly afraid of what she was about to say. She only opened up to people that she knew well, such as Xander, Giles, Buffy and Tara. She realised that these people were here to help her, and that they wouldn't turn on her. 

"I'm here because I don't want to hurt anyone any more, and I guess, to be able to control myself," Willow said. She watched as Montague and Samantha slightly nodded at her response. 

"That's good," Samantha said to her, trying to encourage her. Willow just weakly smiled at her after her heart was recovering from the shock of opening up to a complete stranger. However, Willow was growing to like the High Priestess as her presence was soothing and comforting. Willow thought that the High Priest was a bit 'down-to-business' and a bit cold, but she liked him as well. 

"That was a good start, but I'm afraid that we both need rest from the jet lag," Giles said. 

"Yes, of course, you both must be exhausted," Montague said. 

"Not really," Willow replied. She didn't know why she wasn't tired. She hadn't felt too tired in the last couple of days, but had been forcing herself to sleep to escape from the world. Even in Giles's car she had forced herself to sleep because she couldn't stand the wait to get to the Coven. She wanted it to be over and done with. Also, Willow welcomed the dream world, which was mostly good at the moment. 

"I'll have Michael, the man who brought you here, show you your quarters, and then, take you on a tour of the village if you would like?" Samantha said to Willow. Willow nodded in response. 

"I have one question though," Willow said. 

"And what may that be?" Montague inquired. 

"Will Giles be staying here?" Willow asked. 

"Rupert is a grown man. He is welcome if he wishes to stay, and if you wish him to stay," Samantha said. Willow nodded her head again. "Will you be staying with us Rupert?"

"I'd love to," Giles replied. It was obvious to everyone that he wanted to see more of the coven. 

Samantha and Montague stood up and showed their guests to the door. Once Willow got to the door, she saw Michael come over from a group of people. 

"Michael, could you please show Rupert and Willow to their quarters. They'll be in the cabin on the edge of the settlement. Afterward could you please show Willow around our settlement, and maybe, make a few introductions," Montague told him. 

"Sure, I'd be happy to," Michael replied. "If you'll follow me please," Michael said while starting to walk away. Giles followed after Michael, and Willow followed after Giles. She hugged herself again once she came outside into the cold. As they walked through the settlement, Willow only saw five or six cabins, but quite a few tents around the place. She saw a cabin at the edge of the clearing and Willow guessed that it was the cabin that they would be staying in, although Willow didn't quite like the idea of sharing a place with Giles the whole time. 

"Mr. Giles, you'll be staying up that end, and Willow will be staying here," Michael explained while firstly pointing to his right, and then to his left. Willow frowned and looked to Michael. 

"Isn't it just one big cabin?" she asked him. Michael laughed as he replied.

"Yeah, it is one big cabin. But there's two sections to it. They're practically identical." Giles moved off towards his end of the cabin, and Willow moved towards the door to her cabin. She opened the door and immediately noticed how cosy her room was. It was also nice and warm. The door was on the far left side of the room, and the room stretched out forwards and to her right. She walked further into the room and looked around. There was a nice big bed, which she could see was wooden and made by hand. It was along the front wall of the room, right under the window. It had occult symbols engraved into the head and foot of the bed. Further along, she saw a wooden hand made chair that also had the same occult symbols engraved into it, and it was beside a simple wooden desk. In the back left corner of the room there was a nice open space, with a wardrobe that was in the wall the only thing in the way. Willow saw an opening on the right hand wall and walked towards it. There was a small room with an ice box, and a couple of other boxes, obviously for storing things in them. She turned and walked back out of her room only to find Michael still waiting there. 

"Huh?" she asked. Michael got a confused look across his face. "Oh, right, the grand tour," Willow added, obviously not remembering about it. She saw Giles come out of his room and walk towards them. 

"While you're getting shown around, I'll go to the car and get our things," Giles said. Willow just looked at him, and then back at Michael. She saw for the first time that he had straight dark hair that ran loosely down to his ears, and that he was taller than her. He was wearing a loose fitting brown shirt with long khaki pants. Willow hugged herself again as she felt the cold. It felt good to be held by something, even if it was her own arms. Michael started to walk, and Willow walked beside him. 

"Over there's the centre of the settlement. Usually at night time, there's a fire there and everyone gathers around. Sort of like the big social thing around here," Michael said while pointing ahead. Willow guessed that he was the same age as her. Willow was now walking a bit behind him. "Over there's the communal toilets and showers. On the left is the female, and on the right the male," Michael explained while pointing to a cabin that looked the same as the rest of them. "The building you met the Montague and Samantha in is the main building. All our rituals are held there if it's too cold outside. It's also the main gathering point." Willow looked over to it, and then back at Michael, who had stopped and who was looking at her. "You cold?" Willow just looked at him, and slowly nodded her head. "Right. I'll try to make this as quick as I can then… do you want to get introduced to anyone?" 

"No… not yet," Willow replied. 

"Okay. Well, I've basically shown you all you need to know," Michael said. "Any questions?" Willow thought a minute and then, she came up with the perfect question.

"Do you know who I am? Why I'm here?" she asked. The question seemed to take Michael by surprise, but he didn't show it too much. 

"Umm, yes. Everyone knows who you are, and what you've done," Michael replied. Willow just closed her eyes and nodded her head. 

"Okay," she weakly replied. She looked around at the settlement again, and she realised how much Tara would have loved this place. Willow heard Michael saying something, and some other people replying to him, but it didn't register in her mind that people were still with her. She wondered what it would be like if Tara was with her now, at the coven. She would be in heaven. This place was designed for people like her. Tears came to her eyes as Willow realised that Tara would never get to see this place, ever. Before she knew it, her thoughts were out of control, and Willow was trying desperately to hold back the tears. That was the last thing she needed; to break down in front of the whole settlement. She missed Tara so much, and she would never get to see her again. Desperately, she tried to stop her mind from wondering all over the place, and she remembered the cow that she had seen earlier. She concentrated as hard as she could on what the cow looked like, and slowly, her other thoughts began to drift away. 

Michael watched as the girl in front of him literally broke down in front of him. His first reaction was that it was something that he said, but he couldn't figure out what it was. He knew his friends had come up to him just before Willow broke down, but right now he didn't care. He was glad when Willow looked up again and the tears had stopped. Her eyes were red though, and he could see that she was struggling not to cry. 

"What's wrong?" he asked. "Was it something that I said to upset you?" He watched Willow as she gulped and then looked at him.

"No, no. I-it's just that… Tara would have loved this place," Willow managed to get out. Michael was confused at first, but then he guessed that Tara must have been Willow's girlfriend. 

"Why don't you go back to your room. And go to sleep or something," Michael suggested. He had no idea what to do, but he knew that he would go and see the High Priest and Priestess after this. He saw Willow nod her head repeatedly and turn and walk back to her cabin.

After they had all seen her go inside, Clifford and James turned to Michael, confused expressions on their faces. 

"What did you do to her?" James asked. 

"I-I didn't do anything. I was just showing her around, like I was asked to, and she just burst out crying," Michael defended himself. "What are you doing here anyway?" he asked both of them. 

"I had was meditating, and I felt something wrong. It's like there's a disturbance or something. It's hard to explain. It's like everything's different around this part of the forest. Something dark's here, but it isn't dark as in evil-dark, but dark as in sad-depressed-night time dark," James said. We were just on the way to tell the High Priestess, but then we saw you and Willow, and thought we'd come over and introduce ourselves. 

"You felt it too? I thought it was just me being paranoid, like usual," Michael said. 

"We'd better go and tell the High Priest and Priestess," Clifford said. 

"Don't you think that they'd already know?" Michael asked them both. 

"They're too wrapped up in this new girl to notice anything other than her. They might have overlooked it, or they might not have even noticed it at all. The whole coven has been preparing for Willow's arrival for days. I don't think they would have the time to meditate and sense these things," James explained. "Come on, let's go." 

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So, what do you think?

**__**

I also need someone who's reading this, and who isn't afraid of the plot being totally spoiled to e-mail me. I have a couple of ideas of where the story could go, and where it could end, and I need someone's opinion of the ideas I have. I want to know what the best idea is, and the worst idea, and I need to know which idea is the most emotional, and which is absolute crap. If you don't mind the plot being spoiled, and think that you'd be able to give advice (almost anyone could give advice), just e-mail me at **_theaussiewitch@hotmail.com_** **_. And, I need someone to do this, because I can't write the story unless I know what I'm working towards. I may be able to write one more chapter, maybe two, but after that, I need a place to go to. Right now, I've just got so many ways this could end it's not funny, so I need the help!_**

Also, soon, this story **_may_** move away from Willow. But I know at the end, the focus will come back down onto Willow. This story is not just going to be what happens Between season 6 and season 7, it is going to be my version of Season 7 (as the last Buffy season ever! No continuation of the story afterwards… there's a hint for ya). I'm using **some** season 7 spoilers, but not a lot. 


	9. Chapter 8

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Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and Co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.

****

Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)

****

Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)

****

Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older). 

****

Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well. 

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Reply to Reviews: _"Nice enough story (though way to little Spike , but you seem to keep forgetting one thing. Spike got exactly what he wanted. Like Joss and Jane Espenson said, Spike wanted a soul and he only went to the demon to get that soul. The chip was never really the issue."_:- **As said in this chapter, in my opinion, Spike wanted the chip, but deep down inside he wanted a soul. Because of the lack of looking deep within himself (so he would know that he wanted a soul instead of a chip), he went there saying that he wanted the chip, but got a soul cause the demon read him better than he read himself**

a very good story its nice to see a season 7 story thats just an excuse to get s/b together the thing is just a question when willow was drawing and channleing that earth spirit/magic in the statue alot of that went into xander r we going to see any after effects of that. :-** You will see after effects of that, but it will be VERY (emphasis on the very) subtle, and you probably won't realise that there have been effects until right at the end, when everything is explained and as you look back over the story and say 'oh, well, will you look at that'. **

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Chapter 8

Spike continued to look at his hand. He was puzzled by what had just happened. He had stood in the sun for at least a minute, but he didn't burst into flames. His hand was still stinging from the burns he obtained, but he ignored the pain. 

"What the bleedin' hell 'ave you done to me?" he yelled into the darkness. By looking at the light that was streaming in the cave, Spike realised that it must be late in the afternoon, which meant that he'd be able to leave the cave soon. He didn't know why the demon had given him his soul. He had come to the caves to get his chip out. As Spike thought about the reasons for coming to the demon, he felt something inside himself. It was an unknown feeling to him, and he wondered what it was. He thought about why he wanted his chip out. It was to hurt Buffy. But then, he realised, that he could already hurt Buffy, ever since she had come back from the grave. It was then he realised what the feeling down in his stomach was. He was lying to himself. He never wanted the chip out. Deep down, inside, he wanted Buffy to love him, and the only way that could happen was for him to acquire a soul. "Oh crap." 

Michael watched as Clifford knocked on the door to the main cabin. As far as they all knew, Samantha and Montague didn't leave after Willow had left them. After waiting a moment, Clifford opened the door and went inside. Michael went after him, and James after him. He saw Montague and Samantha sitting on two chairs, talking to each other. They both looked at the trio of friends. 

"Yes? What can we help you with?" Samantha asked kindly. 

"We've sensed something in the area. Something dark. We thought that you'd like to know," James said. 

"We thought that you would be concentrating on the new girl, Willow, too much to notice," Clifford added in. 

"We sensed it," Montague said to them. 

"Really?" Clifford asked, a bit surprised. 

"Yes," Samantha confirmed. 

"Do you know if it's a threat? I mean, something that powerful, it might harm us," Michael said. 

"We know what it is, and we are hoping that no harm will come to anyone," Montague answered. 

"What is it?" James asked, almost a bit too eagerly. 

"The dark presence? It's Willow," Samantha said. Michael watched as James and Clifford's eyebrows raised in surprise. Michael was surprised as well. He had sensed the power behind the darkness, and it's vastness. After James had recovered his senses, he said,

"Willow? The girl out there? She doesn't look that powerful, or dark either." 

"Don't let looks misguide you. You know what we have told you, what she's done, and what she's capable of. Why are you surprised now, that it's Willow?" Montague asked. 

"I-It's just that, when you told it to us, it seemed like a dream. Like something on the news. It's not in your part of the world, and it doesn't affect you, so, well, in a way, you don't attach it to reality," Clifford said. 

"But it is reality," Samantha vetoed. Clifford and James stood there. It was obvious that they were confused by how they felt. 

"We don't attach it to our reality. To our lives. We know it's real, but it's not apart of our lives, our routine, so we disregard it," Michael said. Montague looked to him in shock. 

"You're right," Montague complimented. Everyone stood around for a couple of minutes, an awkward silence passing between everyone. 

"When is the spell going to take place to get the coven's power out of her?" James asked. 

"Tonight," Samantha replied. 

"Tonight? That's so soon," Michael said, concern in his voice. "Why so soon?"

"She's unstable. The love for her friends has kept the magicks locked inside her, but now, she doesn't have any one to love here, except for Mr. Giles. If we don't get our power, and the power that she absorbed back soon, she will loose control," Samantha said. "We can not let that happen!"

"We should start preparing soon, very soon. It's almost dark," Montague said to the three youngsters. 

"Tell _everyone_ that it's happening tonight. We will need everyone's power to help us, including all the solitaries," Samantha said. 

"We will," Michael said. "Blessed be." 

"Blessed be," Samantha and Montague replied. With that, Michael, Clifford and James turned and left the cabin and strode through the settlement. They told everyone that they came across what was going to happen. Michael was surprised when most of the people they told didn't even know that Willow was at the settlement with them. Eventually, they made their way back over to Willow and Giles's cabin, where they decided to tell Giles instead of Willow. It was in their reasoning that Willow needed to hear what was to be done from someone she knew. 

She sat in the uniform grey blocked room on her bed, staring that the corner. She often did that when she was deep in thought. Over the last couple of hours, she had a nagging feeling in the back of her head, like she needed to be somewhere, and that it was urgent. Her body was screaming at her for action, but she could do nothing except sit. Eventually, after what seemed like a long time, she got up and stretched for a while, but the bed beckoned to her. Giving into temptation, Faith returned to her bed and got under the covers. It was only early in the morning, but Faith was tired from the riot that had happened the previous night. Three prisoners, who thought that they were hot shots, and who were in for life imprisonment decided to have some fun and try to beat up as many wardens as they could. Faith laughed she remembered that between them all, they had managed to beat up one of the wardens. It wasn't the fight that had kept Faith awake. It was the memories of her former self. She was once like that. She would have beaten up anyone just for the hell of it, and she enjoyed it. As Faith thought about it, she realised that even that was better than what she had become now. Now, she was just a mindless shell who didn't have an opinion on anything, and who was possibly the coldest and hardest person in the prison. She didn't care what happened, as long as she got her meals, and no one got in the way. Faith knew that she was the top dog around the small maximum security prison located on the outskirts of LA. She had attained the reputation when she had first arrived, beating up anyone who even challenged to get in her way. People had made bets on the 'toughies' who thought they could take her, but they couldn't obviously. 

Sleep was finally catching up to Faith as she lay in her bed under the blanket. Her eyelids had just closed for the last time before she drifted into rest when a loud banging sound sent her bolt upright. 

"Yo. Prisoner two-oh-six-seven-seven, wake up! You got mail! Looks like it's from the government or somethin'," Faith heard. She grumpily got up and grabbed the letter from the mailman's hand and threw the letter onto the bench that she had, where most of her stuff went. It wasn't much. A photo, some paper, a pen, and now a letter. She had used the pen and paper once to write a letter to Buffy, saying how she changed, but she never even thought about sending it. She didn't want to interfere into Buffy's life again. She felt sorry for the girl. Angel had told her how she died, and then was brought back again from heaven. At first, Faith didn't believe it, but Angel insisted that it was true. It was at some point around there that Faith felt sorry for the girl, but she was going to do nothing about it. Faith climbed back into her bed and under the blanket and finally went to sleep. 

Willow sat bolt upright as she awoke from another dream. At first, she didn't notice her surroundings. Then, things became clear to her, again. She was in England, in the middle of a forest with a coven that was going to help her. Willow didn't notice that she wasn't in a bed or in her room. She looked down at her lap. Deep down inside her, she could feel power beyond her wildest dreams, locked up, trying to break out. Willow could feel it coursing through her veins and reaching out to every part of her being. It was a part of her. Slowly, the feeling began to increase, until Willow was aware of every inch of her body, but she didn't notice. She just kept staring at her lap and thinking about the coven. Finally, Willow took in her surroundings. She noticed that she was on a hard wooden floor, inside a large room somewhere. She tried to look around, but the room was pitch black. She could see moonlight streaming in through the windows throughout the room, illuminating the floor. Willow snapped her head to the left as she heard a sound. 

"W-Who's there? Where am I?" Willow asked. 

"Do not worry my child. It is only me; Samantha," she heard from the darkness. 

"What am I doing here?" Willow asked, obviously scared. 

"This is where you belong childe," Samantha replied from the darkness. She moved forward, into the moonlight so that only her front was illuminated. 

"Where is here?" Willow asked. There was no reply from Samantha as she slowly moved towards Willow. Willow saw a brief movement beside Samantha, and she looked to see another person coming out of the darkness. She looked around her, and she saw people moving out of the darkness around her, in a circle. 

"I can feel you. You cling to the past. It keeps you back young one. You can become a great and powerful being. You need to let go of the past. You need to let go of the ones you love," Samantha said in a quiet voice, almost at a whisper. 

"X-Xander? Buffy? Giles?" Willow asked. 

"You need to let go of the ones you love," Samantha said again. "She is a part of you, and is the thing holding you back." Willow looked at Samantha, and at the others around her, who were slowly closing the circle around her. Willow was aware that she was still on the floor, and she was getting scared by her situation, and she tried to get up, but couldn't. Willow looked down at her legs, which didn't seem to be working, and then back up at Samantha. Willow looked at her long flowing and wavy blonde hair. Right in front of her eyes, Samantha's features morphed. Her skin wrinkled, and her hair greyed until she was beyond recognition. She was ageing in front of Willow's eyes. 

"What are you talking about?" Willow asked, trying to distract Samantha. 

"She is a part of you. She is holding you back. Without her, you will be great. Ultimate. She has entered your body, your soul. You need to get her out of there young one," Samantha said. "Without her, there's no holding back. If you will not get her out, we will." Pure and utter fear and realisation swept through Willow

"Tara…" she whispered. As soon as she did, everyone around her started chanting. 

__

Inyuk. Ginsea. Syruium. Cola. Inyuk. Ginsea. Syrium. Cola.

Willow was scared beyond comprehension as the circle tightened around her. She could feel something inside her stirring about, and showing it's way to the surface. She expected it to be bad. The coven was here to help her, to bring out the damaging things that were within her. Instead, she felt happiness. Her skin crawled, and tingled. She could feel every inch of her being. Inside her, she could feel ecstasy building. Willow fell backwards so she was lying on the floor. Her eyes were closed in ecstasy, and her mouth slightly open and her back arched upwards. She had no idea what was happening around her. All that mattered was her body, and her insides. The world drifted away, and there was just her. Suddenly, she recognised something familiar deep within her. She tried to concentrate on it, but the sensations hitting her body were too great. Willow knew what was happening. Total, absolute power was flowing through her, and she felt comfortable with it. She felt complete. It was magick, at its simplest and purest level. Then, the feeling she recognised returned, but stronger this time. She could feel it being pulled out of her. Images flashed through her mind. 

In the first, she was inside a smallish room, looking at a vending machine, trying to move it towards some double doors with her power. Something was trying to get through the doors and harm her, and another that she felt in the room. She felt a touch on her hand, and looked to see Tara intertwine her fingers in hers, and together they moved the vending machine with their combined power. 

In the next vision, there was a circle of white light surrounding her, and Tara as they were chanting. Willow immediately recognised it as the spell that she and Tara had performed to take Willow to the nether realms. Willow saw herself fall back onto a group of pillows, gasping as power flowed through her. Willow realised then, by the look that Tara was giving her, that it wasn't their shared power. It was Tara's soul that was flowing through Willow. Tara had opened up herself to Willow, and she flowed through her. Willow looked at Tara, who was now holding Willow's head in her lap, caressing it. Willow knew that from that moment on, the two had shared a special bond, and now Willow knew why.

The next vision, Willow saw herself and Tara in bed, the night that Tara had returned to her. She once again felt power flowing through every inch of her being.

Willow forced herself to open her eyes. She had just realised what was going on, and what was going to happen. Remembering everything that they had done together, Willow almost felt like there was a part of Tara inside her. She felt it getting pulled away, out of her body by the coven. In an instant, without even knowing it, Willow saw an image of her soul. She saw a dull grey ball of energy. More than a third of it was white, and gave off brightness. As Willow concentrated on the bright spot, more memories of Tara flooded her mind. She could smell her, hear her, taste her, and see her. Willow knew that this part of her was a part of Tara. She realised that Tara was still with her, deep down inside her, and the thought brought pure joy to her. 

Willow also looked at the other sections of the ball of energy, made up of grey. There was however, a large patch, darker grey than the rest. Willow concentrated on it. Feelings of her power trip, and her magick addiction flooded her now, and she knew that this was a part of her too. She felt the brightness being taken away, and she tried to hang onto it, but it was being ripped from her. Her whole body tried to hang onto it, but it was getting ripped through it. Then, in one final instant, the energy left her body and Willow collapsed back down onto the floor. For a second, the vision of her soul lingered, and Willow could see it morph from dull grey to a very dark shade. Willow felt as though half of her was missing. She could feel the dark energy spread throughout her body, and she felt a slight breeze on her face. She looked around her, only to see red energy crackling around her hands, and around all the coven members, who now lay on the ground. 

"What have they done to me," Willow whispered as she looked down at her hands. 

She gasped and looked around. Her surroundings had changed. She looked down at her hand, which was now normal. As she looked around her, she could see that she was in her cabin once again, under the blankets of her bed. She looked out the window and saw that the sun had just set as the first stars shone down on her from the sky. Willow realised that it was only a dream, but a thought chilled her to the bone. She knew that at least a part of it was true. 

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I know that the whole thing being a dream is really lame, and unoriginal, but it is needed for the story line. See the next chapter to see why the dream is needed! I'm working on the next chapter right now…. And thanks for the reviews!!! More that I get, the quicker I write (wink wink, nudge nudge) 


	10. Chapter 9

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Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and Co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.

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Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)

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Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)

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Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older). 

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Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well. 

Authors Note: This is gonna be tough to write, so bear with me for this chapter please. Centred around Willow! (like everything else. After two or three chapters, the focus will go off Willow and back to events happening in Sunnydale, and the rest of the Scoobies. Some suprises in store!!!!

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Chapter 9

Xander now looked at the ruined Magic Box under the light of day, and he could honestly say that he had his work cut out for him. The place was a mess. They would virtually need to rebuild the place, and that would have a high cost. To the casual on looker, the shop would only look like it's been abandoned for a while. That was, until they walked inside and saw that there were great big gaping holes in the walls, and that most of the roof had collapsed. 

"So?" Xander heard. He looked to where the voice had come from, and saw that it was Anya. 

"So, what?" Xander replied. 

"When are you going to start to work?" Anya asked him, a hint of hope in her voice. 

"You know Anya, this is going to cost a bit," Xander stated.

"How much?" Anya asked. Xander pulled out a folded piece of paper from his pocket, which was the quote that one of his workers had done on the place. 

"Here. Take a look. I haven't looked at it yet," Xander said while handing her the piece of paper. He watched Anya look at it for a while, and then look up at Xander.

"How could you?" she asked. "How could you do this to me?" 

"W-what? I haven't done anything," Xander stumbled, not knowing what Anya was blaming him for. 

"Look at this. I can't afford this!" Anya said while repeatedly pointing to the piece of paper. 

"Give me a look," Xander said while reaching out for the piece of paper. 

"No. I never want to see you again Xander Harris," Anya almost screamed. She suddenly paused, and looked into the distance while clutching the piece of paper with the quote on it. "I have to go now… Unlike some people, I have a job to do," Anya said while glaring at Xander. Xander just looked at her with a confused look on his face. He watched as a white smoke like solid surrounded her in an instant, and then faded away: Anya not there. Remembering that she was a vengeance demon, Xander looked around to see if anyone had seen her teleport out, and thankfully, no one did. Xander looked at the piece of paper, and a sudden wind picked up and started carrying it towards him. He bent down and caught it in the wind and had a look at it.

"Damn. That's expensive." He looked over the quote again, knowing that there had to be some mistake, but he was disappointed when there was none. He saw a figure near him, and looked away from the paper. 

"Hey Xande-I mean Mr Harris. Are we gonna get started or what?" the man said. His name was Johnny and usually he was Xander's boss, but he let Xander run this job as he knew that he had a personal interest in it. Xander just looked at him again, and then back at the quote paper. He was now holding it loosely in his hand. He looked back to Johnny.

"Yeah. Let's get to work," he said while throwing the quote into the bin. 

The light danced around on her face. She couldn't believe that they were actually going to go through with it tonight. It was so soon, and in her opinion, they weren't ready. They had a long way to go before they were ready, and it was stupid to try to do it tonight. She was sitting on a long log, looking into the fire; mesmerised. She often would sit out here for hours, wondering about life and the things around her. It was her way to ground herself, and to deal with things. She would spend hours alone, in the middle of the night staring into the fire. Others called her weird, but she didn't care. As she thought about it, everywhere she went people called her weird. In the outside world, most people didn't understand what was right in front of their eyes, and therefore couldn't understand her gifts. When she had come to the coven that she had heard about, she had been accepted, at first. But she was unlike most people, and her ways of doing things were often weird. Cassia knew that she didn't fit in anywhere, that she didn't belong, but she was fine with it. If people commented on the weird styles she wears her long blonde-brown hair, she would just shrug them off. If people commented on the bizarre ways she acted, or the weird way she spoke, she would just shrug it off too. 

Cassia knew that it was almost time to do the ritual, but she was afraid of what they might do to the poor girl. She had heard the entire story from Samantha herself. As soon as she had heard of the two Witches in America, she had identified with both of them immediately. She heard a stick snap nearby and she snapped her head around and looked in the direction that it had come from. She could see a figure slowly moving towards her out of the darkness. As the figure came closer to the fire, features began to be made out. Cassia could tell that the figure was female by the way her body was shaped. Light barely made it to the girl, but it was enough for Cassia to see what she looked like. She had short fiery red hair, and was wearing a thick sweater, and thick long pants. She walked slowly towards the fire, with her arms crossed across her chest, and her head down. Cassia hadn't seen this person before, but she quickly dismissed the idea that the girl was a stranger, as Cassia hadn't seen many people of the coven before. 

"Hi," Cassia said. She watched as the girl stopped and looked up, surprised at hearing another voice. The girl looked at Cassia for a while, and Cassia could feel her gaze over her. 

"Hello," the girl replied in a very quiet voice. She walked over to another log and sat down on it and gazed into the fire. 

"I'm Cassia…," Cassia started, thinking that the other girl would catch on and introduce herself. "You are?" The other girl looked up from the fire and directly into Cassia's eyes. Cassia looked into hers, and she could see that they weren't normal, even if she hadn't seen this girl before. It was almost like there was a heavy glaze over her eyes. Cassia could feel the other girl's eyes staring right into her soul, and at that, she immediately became nervous. It wasn't often that someone could just look into her like that. 

"Willow," the other girl replied as she broke eye contact. Cassia knew that name from somewhere, but she couldn't put her finger on it. Then, the realisation hit her. This was Willow. The girl from America. 

"Oh… umm… ahh," Cassia replied in shock. She didn't know what to do, or to say in the presence of the girl that had been the main topic of discussion between everyone in the settlement over the last couple of days. "W-w-what are you d-doing down here?" Cassia asked, her nervousness at being with the girl clearly showing. Again, Willow didn't reply for a while. 

"Had a bad dream… sat in my room… then it was dark and cold. I saw the fire, and came down," Willow quietly and sadly replied. Cassia could tell that the girl was in deep, deep pain. She wanted to comfort her any way possible, but she didn't know what to do that wouldn't set Willow off. She tired to think about anything that wasn't related to Willow's past to talk about. 

"So. You know about tonight?" Cassia asked. 

"What's tonight?" Willow asked her, a bit of fear and concern in her voice. 

"You know. The ritual. To get all that power out of you," Cassia replied, immediately knowing that she had failed, already, bringing up Willow's past. 

"Tonight? When?" Willow asked, with more volume now, and looking at Cassia. Cassia could easily see that Willow was distressed. 

"Umm, I-I don't k-know. Soon… I'd say 'round about now," Cassia said while looking away from the fire. She could see two people coming towards her and Willow. She looked back to Willow and saw that she was looking where Cassia had looked before. Cassia watched, confusion setting in when Willow got up and started to slowly back away from the two people coming to get her. She could see that they were Michael and Clifford, possibly the nicest people that Cassia knew. She heard a loud thud from where Willow was meant to be, and she turned her head again, only to see that Willow had tripped over a tree branch and was now lying on her back. Michael and Clifford walked over to her. 

"Hey Willow. You've got to come with us. It's time to start the ritual," Michael said. 

"W-w-w-w-what a-are you g-going to d-do with me?" Willow asked, obviously scared. Cassia watched her look up to Michael and Clifford again. Cassia could see Willow recompose herself. "What's the ritual going to do?" 

"We don't really know that. It's just a ritual to get the coven's power out of you. You know, that stuff you sucked out of Mr. Giles. It shouldn't take long, and all you have to do is sit there. You might be a bit sleepy afterwards though. Samantha said that you've been running off of it for the last couple of days, and the lack of power might make you tired," Michael said in a soft voice. "Yeah, and there's almos-"

"Michael. Shut up," Clifford said. "You're babbling, again," Clifford said. 

"Oh. It's just that, this ritual, it should be great. I haven't participated in any big coven rituals before," Michael replied. 

"Come on Willow, let's go," Clifford said while offering his hand out to the young witch. Cassia watched as she took it and got up, but she could tell that there was something Willow was hiding. 

"Cass. You coming?" Michael asked. Her train of thoughts stopped and she got up. 

"Yeah, I'm coming," she replied weakly as she watched Willow walk behind the two boys, her arms crossed over her chest, and lost deep in thought. 

Buffy walked down the stairs, her spirit already drained, and she hadn't even started yet. She was wondering how Willow and Giles were doing in England, and was wondering why they hadn't called yet. She put it up to the reason that they were in the middle of no where and probably didn't have access to a phone. She sluggishly walked into the kitchen and grabbed her red and white hat. 

"You going?" Dawn asked her from behind the refrigerator's door. 

"Yeah. Off to the Double Meat Palace, for a full ten hour shift. Can't wait," Buffy said with fake enthusiasm. 

"You know, you could try looking for a better job," Dawn suggested. 

"And what am I going to get? I can't get any decent career because I've got the whole 'One girl in all the world to fight off the forces of darkness' thing going for me. I can't call in and say that's a reason to miss work, well, not with any other job anyway," Buffy replied. 

"You could, I don't know, work for Xander or something," Dawn said while closing the refrigerator door. 

"Tried that. Killed demons and saved everyone, but they all thought I was crazy. And, unless he's got another crew, no one will want to come near me again," Buffy replied.

"There's this new place opening up. They call it something like MacDonalds or something. They're meant to be even more popular than the Double Meat Palace or something. Maybe you should try there. You might get paid a bit more," Dawn suggested. 

"What have you been reading? I think if there was any place with a bigger reputation than the Double Meat Palace, we would have heard about them… Plus, I know of the Double Meat Palace's secret ingredient…" Buffy started as realisation swept through her. "Hey!" Buffy exclaimed. 

"You can sell the secret ingredient and make millions!" Dawn said enthusiastically. 

"I wasn't thinking of doing that, but it's a good idea…" Buffy trailed off. 

"Then what were you thinking?" Dawn asked while pulling toast out of the toaster. Buffy sat on the small island in the middle of the kitchen and put her hands on the edge and looked at Dawn.

"Well, I was thinking, that I could use the threat of exposing their secret ingredient to make them find me a better job," Buffy said. 

"Sort of like making them give you a promotion," Dawn said. 

"No, like find me a better job. Not working at the Double Meat Palace. They could put in a good word for me and make up some little white lies that could help me get a better job," Buffy said. 

"That is so cool. Go Buffy the mastermind!" Dawn cheered. Buffy got off the island and now, she happily strode out the door in her red and white striped uniform. 

Spike patiently waited for the sun's rays to go down. He knew that it was sunset as the rays that were entering the cave were now a golden colour. He was leaning against the cave's wall, just out of reach of the sun's rays. He was still curious about his condition: being able to survive a few minutes in the sun. He was also wondering if the soul did that to him, but then, he remembered that Angel couldn't do that. Spike didn't see the big deal with having a soul. All he had to do was not to think about the things his body had done as an animated corpse, and he was fine. He didn't understand why Angel was so dark and brooding. Spike stuck his hand out into the sunlight. This time, his hand didn't tingle or burn at all. It felt perfectly normal, and Spike was surprised. Slowly, he moved the rest of himself out into the light. Again, nothing happened. 

"You bloody beauty!" 

Spike stood there for a few minutes, making sure that he wouldn't start to sizzle and burn when he was half a mile out of the cave. Then, he took a step forward, and another, and another, until he was standing outside, in the African Savanah. He looked around himself, and he could see nothing but a dead tree, grass and rocks. He looked to the sun, which momentarily blinded him for a few seconds. It wasn't set yet, but still above the horizon. Spike guessed that he still had a whole hour before the sun finally set. He looked back to the landscape, and for the first time, he noticed that this wasn't the place that he had been before. This wasn't the place he had trekked through on his way to the cave. There had been trees, and huge rocks, and a settlement before, but now there was nothing. The landscape was different. Spike turned around to look behind him, to where the cave was, but it was gone, and Spike was met by the same vastness. 

"You've got to be bloody kiddin' me!" 

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Sorry to all you Spike Fans, for not having him in a lot, but he will be a major player in the overall storyline, just as soon as he finds out where he is, and what's going on with him…

Again, sorry for the whole 'it's a dream thing' in the last chapter (the one before this one), but you will see the results of that dream in the next chapter!!! 


	11. Chapter 10

_________________________________________

****

Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and Co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.

****

Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)

****

Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)

****

Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older). 

****

Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well. 

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Authors Note: All I can say to all the Willow Fans out there is that Willow WILL NOT get a new love interest. So don't scream at me, I know that she needs her grieving time, and I wouldn't do that cause I'm one of the biggest Willow (and Tara, both as a couple and as separate people) fans. 

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Chapter 10

As Willow entered the room, she saw a lot of hooded figures standing around, idly talking. The room was lit by torches that hung off the walls, and gave the whole scene a medieval look as the light from the flames danced around the room. Willow now noticed a large pentagram painted onto the floor in the middle of the room now, where the rug used to be when she was in her earlier with Samantha, Montague and Giles. She was surprised when everyone turned and looked at her as she entered through the doorway. Michael and Clifford each put a hand on her back as they escorted her to Samantha and Montague, who were roughly in the middle of everything. She was glad when she saw Giles in with them, and all doubts she had before faded. If Giles was there and going along with their plans, nothing could be wrong. Willow looked over to her shoulder and saw the girl, Cassia who she had met by the fire enter the room. It was the first time Willow had gotten a look at her, and she was also dressed in the long brown robes that everyone else was. There were a select few who were dressed in long green robes, and Willow guessed that they were members of the coven. 

"Hello Willow," Samantha greeted with a warm smile. Willow just weakly smiled back. "There's nothing to be afraid of. This part of the ritual is very easy and no harm can come to you… All we're going to do is to get our power back from you," Samantha said while reaching out and holding Willow on the shoulder. She looked to Giles, and then back at Samantha, uneasy about the dream she had had. When she looked at Samantha, she could tell that the dream she had was probably out of her own fear more than anything else, as by the looks of things, Samantha didn't mean to hurt anyone. 

"O-okay," Willow said weakly, not sure what else to say. 

Cassia watched as Samantha guided Willow to the middle of the pentagram. She had doubts that this was the same Willow that she was told about. At the fire, Willow had looked like a gentle, timid and very withdrawn woman, and Cassia couldn't picture her harming a fly, let alone killing someone and trying to end the world. Everyone started moving around Cassia, and she knew that the ritual was going to begin. Everyone gathered around the outside of the pentagram, in a circle, with only Samantha, Montague and Willow inside. The members of the actual coven formed the first ring, while everyone else formed the second and third rings. Cassia was in the second ring, and she had a clear view of what was about happen.

Willow stood in the middle of the pentagram, just like she had been told. She was facing the end of the room that had the door. To her right was Montague, and to her left was Samantha. They were facing her. Around her, she could see everyone with the green robes form a circle around her. Everyone that was wearing the brown robes formed a circle behind them. She watched as Samantha and Montague nodded, and everyone bowed their heads and closed their eyes. Everyone but one person: Cassia. Willow noticed this, but she looked back to the end of the room. She could feel the air around her become very, very warm as everyone's energies were directed at her. She took in a deep breath, and slowly exhaled, unsure of what was to come. She noticed that all the windows in the room were closed, and that the air was perfectly still.

A dull circle of transparent energy slowly shimmered into view around her. It slowly transformed itself into a sphere around her as Willow was lightly lifted an inch above the floor. She knew that this energy was there to draw the power out of her, and she closed her eyes and waited. She felt something inside her stir and move around her body. She was more aware of it now, as it was getting called to the surface. Willow opened her eyes, and she could see Giles standing in the corner of the room, observing the ritual. All of a sudden, there was a lurch inside her. Willow had felt this before, in her dream. All of a sudden, all the feelings of her dream became crystal clear. She could remember every single one with unimaginable detail, and she knew that what was happening to her now was the same thing that had happened in the dream. Warmth began to spread throughout her body. She knew this feeling. It was the same feeling she had every time she and Tara were together. It surfaced from somewhere deep inside her, and slowly made it's way to Willow's skin. She could feel her skin alive, and buzzing with joy. Willow knew that this wasn't the power that she had taken from the coven, as there was something about the energy inside her that had Tara's 'signature'. It belonged only to Tara, and Willow had come to know it well. She could feel it start to leave her body, and she could feel every square inch of her body, inside and out, try to hold it, but the spell was too strong. To Willow, it felt like they were ripping herself out of her body. Willow now felt a strong breeze on her face as her hair was pushed back by it, almost like she was facing the wind on the top of a high mountain peak. With one simple word, the room changed, and Willow was released from the spell.

"No," she calmly commanded. 

Cassia felt the breeze before anyone else did, including Willow. She watched the girl, as she floated at least two feet off the ground now. She was surrounded by a mottled white and yellow sphere of energy. Her head was rolled back slightly, and her eyes were closed. When she opened her eyes, Cassia could see that there was something wrong. Her pupils were black, and took up all the visible section of her eye. Cassia watched as Willow commanded.

"No." Then, in an instant, the sphere around her disappeared and she fell back to the ground, only to land on her feet. Everyone else was still trying to get the spell to work. They all still had their heads bowed, and their eyes closed. Cassia watched as dark red and black energy crackled around Willow's hands, and it reached out and pushed Samantha and Montague to the floor. Willow looked towards the door. "Sleep," she commanded while she waved her hand in front of her. Everyone between her and the door dropped to the floor, except Cassia. Cassia stood there, shocked. She quickly got out of Willow's way. 

"Willow," she heard a pleading voice from the other side of the room. She looked back and saw that Mr. Giles was rushing through the crowd, who looked like they were all unconscious but standing. 

"Stay away!" Willow commanded as she spun around to look at Giles. "You knew," she accused him. Cassia had no idea what Willow was on about. "You knew," Willow repeated. "You knew that they were going to do this to me." 

"Willow? I don't know what you're talking about," Mr. Giles replied. "What happened? Did the spell do something else?" Cassia thought at that moment that Willow would lash out at Mr. Giles, but she kept on talking. 

"They tried to take her away from me. The only thing I have of her left, and they tried to take Tara away from me," Willow replied. Giles had a confused look on his face. Cassia saw Willow turn around and head towards the door. Using her power, Cassia closed the door and put up a barrier spell on it, so Willow couldn't leave. Willow noticed this immediately. "You think you can stop me little witch?" Willow said to her, rage threaded throughout her voice. Cassia moved towards the door and stood between Willow and it. 

"Y-you can't l-leave here," Cassia said, her nervousness showing. "You're m-meant to get b-better here." 

"What the hell would you know about me? About what happened? You weren't even participating in the spell," Willow accused her. "Now get out of the way." Willow took a step forward, but Cassia stood her ground. 

"I want to know what happened," Cassia blurted out. "I didn't p-participate in the spell because I k-knew that I-it was too soon." Willow looked past Cassia, and waved her hand. Cassia turned around and saw that her barrier spell had been destroyed. She saw the door get blasted off of it's hinges and fly at least ten metres. She turned back to Willow. 

"Let me outside," Willow muttered. 

"Y-you have to come through m-me first," Cassia stuttered. She had no idea what she was doing, but it sounded right, and most importantly, it felt right. She couldn't let this girl out of the building like that. 

"Not a problem," Willow muttered back. Red and yellow energy poured from her hands at Cassia, and Cassia was lifted off the ground, the energy flowing through her. Willow knew that it was too much for anyone to handle, and it would give the recipient great pain before it overloaded their bodies and killed them. She could hear someone coming up behind her, and she knew that it was Giles. The energy stopped pouring out of her hands, but Cassia remained floating in the air, four feet off the floor. She was now clutching at her neck as Willow turned around and with the wave of her hand sent Giles flying across the room, knocking him unconscious. Willow turned back to Cassia, and she saw her clutching at her throat, gasping for air. Willow saw the pleading in her green eyes, and something hit home. Willow saw the distress on the girl's face, and she knew that she couldn't extinguish the girl's existence from the world. Cassia fell to the ground, panting for air. When she looked up, she saw Willow standing before her. Her eyes were back to normal, and tears formed in them. Cassia got up, and she could see Willow break down in front of her. She had a great urge to run up to her and hug her and comfort her and protect her from the big bad world that was out to get her, and that had caused her so much pain. She took a step towards her, but Willow ran past her and outside into the forest. Cassia turned around to follow her, but a hand reached her shoulders and stopped her. She turned around to see that it was Mr. Giles, who had obviously just regained consciousness. 

"Let her go. She needs to be alone," he said to her. Cassia turned back towards the doorway and she could just see Willow running off into the forest. She turned around and began helping everyone else up. 

She ran and ran. All she knew was that she had to get away from that place, and away from everyone. Eventually, Willow became tired and she sat down on a fallen tree branch, catching her breath. She thought about what the coven had tried to take away from her, and she instinctively hugged herself, in an act to try and keep everything locked inside her. She had just realised that a part of Tara was still with her, and she didn't want to let go of that. Willow finally let out all her emotions that she had been bottling up for days, and she cried her heart out anyone that would be within hearing distance.


	12. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

After Giles and Cassia had helped everyone recover from Willow's outburst, they began to search the forest for her. The whole population of the settlement spread out in all directions from the centre of the small village. They were all in small groups of three or four. It had been Montague's idea to search in groups, just in case they found Willow and she was out of control again. While this was happening, Montague and Samantha were back in the main settlement trying to find out what had caused Willow to loose control. They had told Giles, Cassia and Michael that they had no idea why she had lost control and that the spell shouldn't have done that to her, no matter what. Cassia remembered what Willow had said earlier; that ''they' tried to take away the only thing that she has left of 'her''. Cassia had no idea what this meant, but she knew that Mr. Giles did, she could read it. She looked at him now as they walked through the forest. The concern that he carried for Willow was clear, but she could see that he was thinking about something else. 

"Mr. Giles. W-what did Willow mean when she s-said that _they_ tried to take the only thing that Willow had left of _her_?" Cassia asked Giles. By his initial reaction, she knew that Mr. Giles knew something. 

"I-I don't really know. I have my suspicions, but I need to talk to Willow about it," Giles replied. Cassia looked at him, and then back at Michael, who was with them. Cassia liked Michael, he was always nice to her, no matter what.

"How do you know that she won't try and kill us or someth…" Michael started, but was cut off when Cassia held out her hand for him to stop. 

"Shh," she said while looking around. Instantly, everything around Michael, Giles and Cassia was silent, even the crickets. 

Giles watched as the young girl looked around the forest. It was obvious that she could hear something. Giles strained his ears to hear something, but he couldn't. He noticed Cassia's arm still outstretched behind her. He then noticed that there was nothing to be heard. There were no noises of animals in the forest, no noise of leaves bustling in the wind; nothing. 

"Come on, this way," Cassia said quietly. Giles saw her hand fall back to her side, and he immediately noticed that the sounds of the forest started up again. He stood there, dumbfounded as Cassia started to walk away. He sensed Michael next to him. 

"Don't ask her how she does it, she just does," Giles heard Michael say.

"What just happened?" Giles asked.

"She asked everything to be quiet, and it was so," Michael replied. "She's amazing like that." 

"So it seems," Giles replied after starting to follow Michael. 

He still didn't know where he was. He was still out in the middle of no where: a different middle of no where than he had been a few hours ago. Spike had walked for what seemed like a lifetime, but he knew it wasn't as the sun had only set an hour or so ago. Still, after all his walking, he was met by the same emptiness. Not a thing around him had changed. Spike was just about ready break down due to all the emotional stresses that had been put upon him in the last few days when he saw a movement on the horizon. It looked like there was a car or truck driving towards him in the distance.

"About bleedin' time." 

Buffy returned home, glad that the meeting at the Double Meat Palace had gone well. It had taken her whole nine hour shift to convince them to find Buffy another job only if she didn't expose their secret ingredient. As she walked into the kitchen, she saw the red light on the answering machine flashing. She was just about to the machine when Xander came in through the back door, obviously depressed about something. 

"What's up?" she asked. 

"It's Anya… she got mad at me for how much it's going to cost to repair the Magic Box," Xander replied. "She screamed at me and then teleported away."

"She'll come 'round, eventually. She just needs to know that you know what you did was wrong, leaving her at the altar and all," Buffy replied. 

"I've tried to tell her that I know that, but she just won't listen," Xander replied.

"Give it time," Buffy replied. There was a slight pause as each didn't know what to say to one another. Buffy turned back to the answering machine.

"This day can't get any worse," Xander said. He then instantly knew that what was going to happen next was going to make matters worse, much worse. He knew that there was a message on the answering machine about Willow. Buffy clicked the play button on the answering machine and listened. 

"Hi Buffy… I-It's Giles. We've arrived at the Coven… C-could you please make sure that you're home at this time tomorrow. I need to talk to you about some things… I-it's Willow. She exploded again, as soon as the coven tried to get their power out of her…. she's alright now, j-just emotionally scarred… Could you please make sure that you're home tomorrow afternoon. We need to talk about her." Buffy and Xander sat after they heard the message. 

"This is just too much," Xander said while staring at the answering machine. 

The four vampires had just chased a young girl down into the sewers from a crypt in the graveyard, and were chasing her. They all knew that she had no chance against them. They were faster and stronger than her, and there were four of them. They had formed a 'close-knit' group weeks ago, and now they were the ultimate hunting partners. They saw the girl round a corner and chased after her. Just as they got to the corner, Joshua, one of the vampires heard the sound of a vampire de-combusting. He looked over to his right and saw that one of his friends had turned to dust. He and the others stopped and looked around for the cause of their friend's death. In an instant, another one of them turned to dust right in front of Joshua: there were now only two left. Joshua saw a figure emerge from the darkness, crossbow in one hand. He was tall and muscular, and what surprised Joshua the most was that he was a vampire. Joshua watched as his friend, Alec, charged at the vampire, only to be turned to dust by a steak that he was holding. Not knowing what to do, Joshua started to back away from the figure, who he could now see had a strange looking symbol on his forehead. In an instant, the stranger was in front of Joshua, and before he knew what had happened, the stranger had swept his legs out from under him. He lay on his back and looked up at the stranger, who was now holding a steak above his head as he bent down above him. 

"In the name of the Master… DIE!" the stranger yelled before the steak was rammed through Joshua's chest. 

He was concerned about the prisoner. She hadn't woken in a day and there was no possible way that she could have exhausted herself. He called out to her again, but still no movement from the prisoner. 

"She's got to be dead or something," he whispered to himself. He made his way back down to the doctors quarters and knocked on the door. He heard the doctor say that it was alright for him to come in, and he entered. "Hey, I think there's something wrong with prisoner two-oh-six-seven-seven. She hasn't woken in a day and she shows no response. I don't think she's moved either," he said to the doctor. 

"Two-oh-six-seven-seven? That's that super-bitch right?" the doctor asked. The warden knew that the doctor had been one of the first people the prisoner had attacked when she got here, and he also knew that the doctor didn't forgive easily. 

"Yeah, it is," he replied. 

"Well then, I'll be there in an hour, have a look at her. Hopefully, she's dead," the doctor replied while turning back to his paperwork. 

She couldn't believe what she was holding right in front of her. She had opened her package at least ten minutes ago, and was still sitting there in shock. 

"I can't believe this," she muttered under her breath. She read the letter again, still not believing what it said. Then, in a fit of rage she ripped it in half, again and again, and again. "Those bastards!" she yelled to no one. Now, she was facing the wall, and she felt as though she would be able to punch a hole right through it and escape but the logical part of her mind knew better. "Why are they doing this to me!" she yelled to the wall. She spun around as she heard the door open. In front of her was the doctor who she knew was a bastard. On either side of him stood two guards, both with batons ready. 

"Calm down. Calm down, please. Tell me what's wrong," the doctor said in the most soothing voice he could, which didn't accomplish it's task too well. Before she knew what she was doing, she rushed towards the doctor and kicked his knees out. She knew that she'd broken one of them when she kicked it as she heard a loud crack. He fell to the floor clutching his knee. 

__

"They aren't going to get me without a fight," she thought to herself. Before the guards had much time to process what was going on in front of them, she was on them. She took the first one out by slamming him head first into the wall, and the second by knocking him out with a high roundhouse kick. She stole the keys off of the guard and ran out the door. She was surprised that no one else had heard the fight. The woman rushed out and ran down the corridor, not noticing all the other similar doors that lined it. When the woman got to the end, she used the guard's key to open the door. Surprisingly, there was not a person in sight. Cautiously, she walked through the main entrance, wondering where everyone had gone. Just as she was almost at the exit, she knew that she had to do something, and she saw just the instrument to do it with: a telephone. She rushed towards it and spent a couple of seconds trying to remember the number that she needed to ring. Finally, when she did remember it, she dialled it at lightning speed and waited for an answer. 

"Hey Buff… I need your help," Faith said into the phone. 


	13. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

They had just finished listening to Giles' message on the answering machine when the phone rang. Thinking that it was Giles, Buffy picked it up as fast as she could. She was disappointed when she heard that it wasn't Giles' voice. She didn't know who it was, but the voice was familiar.

"Hey Buff… I need your help," the voice said. Buffy stood there shocked for a few moments.

"Faith? Is that you?" She asked into the phone.

"Yeah. You're quick today. I gotta get some help. T-the Council's gonna kill me!" Faith said frantically into the phone. 

"What? Faith. I know the Watchers are bastards, but they won't kill you!" Buffy exclaimed.

"I got the letter right here B. Says that they need a Slayer under their control, and that they're real sorry that they have to get me out-o-the way," Faith said matter-of-factly. 

"Faith…" Buffy started, but Faith cut her off.

"Look. I'm breaking out of here, and I'm gonna take those bastards down. Either you can help me or not!"

"Faith!" Buffy called out.

"Hope to see ya around B. I've got to get a move on," Faith said right before she hung up the phone. Buffy put the phone down slowly and looked to Xander.

"Faith rang you up?" He asked. "Has this world gone crazy all of a sudden?" 

"She says that the Council's coming to kill her because they want a Slayer that they can control," Buffy told him. "And since I refuse to work with them and Faith's…unstable, I guess they figure if they kill Faith, they get a new Slayer."

"One they can twist around their little finger," Xander added. Buffy and Xander just stood staring off into space for a few moments. "What are we going to do about her?"

"Right now, Faith's the least of my concerns. I want to find out about Willow," Buffy replied.

He watched her sleeping. He watched as she twitched under the nightmares he was sure she was having. She looked so helpless, so calm while she was sleeping. He looked out the window, into the tall trees of the forest. Through them, he could see that the sun was rising, and he could at last get some rest. Quickly, he turned his head back to the sleeping figure as he heard a whimper come from her. He was amazed at what this girl could do. He was also flattered, as he knew she looked up to him, as a teacher, as one that knows all and can never be wrong. Yet, behind the outer mask lay hurt, and power that he could never hope to imagine. He felt his heart break as he saw tears slowly streaming down her face while she slept. 

"Poor girl," he said quietly to himself. He took off his glasses and methodically cleaned them, as he always does. 

"How is she?" a voice behind him said. Startled, he jumped up and turned around to face it. Giles was glad to find that it was Cassia. With her, was Samantha. 

"Oh. I didn't hear you come in," Giles replied. He looked back to Willow, then back to Cassia and Samantha. "We need to do something… soon." Giles watched as Samantha slowly nodded her head. 

"We now know that we are not going to wrest the power from Willow. Perhaps, if we could teach her to use it properly…" Samantha started.

"I didn't mean that," Giles replied. "I have the utmost confidence that Willow will be able to do that… We need to do something for the pain." Samantha let out a soft sigh.

"I'm afraid the only thing we can do is to comfort her," Samantha said. 

"You mean we can't do anything for this? I can't just stand here and watch her in this much pain. I've known Ms. Rosenberg for the longest out of all of them. I can't just stand here and do nothing!" Giles exclaimed. He saw that Samantha and Cassia were both taken aback by his outburst. There was silence afterwards, no one knowing what to say. After a while, Giles said, "I've contacted Buffy. I'm going to ask her to get everyone to come here… Willow needs to be among friends, people she knows."

"I do not believe that is the best course of action," Samantha said. "Didn't Willow herself say that she needed to be away from them?" 

"Yes she did, but I believe it would be best for her, even if she doesn't know it," Giles replied. 

"I agree with Mr. Giles," Cassia added. Samantha just pressed her lips together.

"Very well. But you must know that I do not embrace this course of action," Samantha said. Giles just nodded his head, and walked towards the door. He opened it, took a step outside, and then ran into an invisible barrier. He took a step back, and stuck his hand out. In front of him, the air wavered. He tried to push his hand forward, but it just got pushed back with the same force. He turned around, storming into the cabin.

"What is the meaning of this?" he exclaimed. S

"It's only for our protection," Samantha said. "We need to keep Willow here, for the time being."

"Well then, let me out!" Giles said, almost shouting. 

"We can not do that," Samantha replied. Then, the image of Samantha shimmered and faded before them. Giles looked to Cassia, who was there wide-eyed. 

"What's happening. I didn't know anything about this," Cassia pleaded with Giles. Giles could see the sincerity in her eyes, and he knew that she wasn't lying. 

In the back of his head, he had a rousing suspicion, and Giles was too afraid to admit it to himself. At this point in time, he didn't know what was right, what was wrong. He didn't know what to think. 

"Damn!" he shouted as he punched the wall in an outburst of anger.

He was now riding in a four wheeled drive across the great expanse of desert that he was in. The great expanse of desert in which he could walk in the daylight. He still didn't know where he was, yet. The owner of the four wheeled drive didn't talk much, and when Spike did question him, there was no response. He decided just to sit back and see where the journey took him. 

Faith had managed to break out of the prison by nightfall. For the afternoon, she had disappeared while the search was out for her. She had to be very careful to avoid the video cameras that were positioned all around the place. Eventually, under the cover of night, she had managed to scale the chain linked fence, and get over the barbed wire with great difficulty, and then do the same again to the outer fence. Now, she was lost in LA, wondering helplessly. She knew only of one place to go to: Angel Investigations, if she could find the place.


	14. Chapter 13

Chapter 13

As Faith soon discovered, being lost in LA at night with no money and very little posessions is not a good thing. She only knew to head in the direction of Angel Investigations, and that's it, and she only had a vague idea of where that was. It had been two years since Faith had been there last, and then she was preoccupied with killing Angel. She knew it was in the CBD, but the CBD of LA was huge, and it would take her forever to find the place without some help. Also, the prison she was being held in was a long way out of town, and Faith had no money to get a cab or train into the heart of LA. 

Faith decided the best thing she could do was to start walking in the direction of the skyscrapers on the horizon, at least that way she might get ten miles closer before the sun came up. 

The sun finally came up, and Downtown LA looked as far away as it had the previous night. Faith soon realised that she'd die of exhaustion before she managed to walk there. She was walking beside the freeway. She had, had her hand stuck out beside her for about an hour while walking, but no one noticed, or no one cared enough to stop and give her a lift. She looked up at the freeway again, and could hardly see a car in sight. That was very unusual, this was LA after all, and there were cars on the roads at almost every time of day imaginable. Faith looked up to see the tall buildings of Downtown LA for what seemed like the hundredth time. She turned and looked around to see if there was any traffic coming yet. Faith saw _one_ car coming down the freeway, three lanes away from her. She scaled concrete wall, which was about five feet high, and stuck her hand out, not expecting any results. She looked up at the sun and guessed that it was between five thirty or six in the morning. Faith couldn't get over how little cars there was on the road. Abruptly the car pulled to a stop beside Faith. She looked to the side and saw that the car was a convertible Ferrari, and that it was yellow; much to Faith's liking. 

"Going somewhere?" the man asked.

"Yeah, heading into town. Care to give me a lift?" Faith replied. The young man, around twenty or so appeared to think for a while, then he leaned over and opened the passenger door, waiting for Faith to get in. 

Everyone was sitting around in the lounge room of the Summers' home, all looking at each other, no one knowing what to do. There was the whole situation with Faith. While no one in particular liked Faith, even if she was meant to be reformed from turning herself in. On the other hand there was Willow's situation in England.

"Xander, how much money do you have?" Buffy asked him. 

"Uhh… I don't really know. Should be enough for a one way ticket to England if that's what you're thinking," he replied. Buffy just nodded in response. 

"Dawn?" Buffy asked.

"Uhh, two hundred dollars, I think," Dawn replied.

"Look, we don't even know how bad the situation with Willow is. I don't think we should be jumping ahead and thinking of going to England or anything at the moment. You two said that Giles'd ring back, and I think that we should wait until he does," Dawn said.

"I wasn't making any major plans, just thinking that's all. Giles was really shaken up on the phone, so it must have been pretty bad, that's all," Buffy replied.

"I say we wait until Giles rings back before we rush off and do anything," Xander added. 

Giles paced the cabin, back and forward, back and forward. He didn't know what to do. The coven had trapped Willow, Cassia and himself inside this cabin. It was quite obvious to Giles that something else was going on, but he couldn't put his finger on it. He stopped pacing and looked out the window towards the main settlement. He couldn't see a thing beyond the barrier, everything now was distorted and blurred. He guessed that the coven had either changed or strengthened the barrier holding them inside.

"Can you do anything to get us out of here?" he pleaded with Cassia. 

"N-no. I can't. I'm only good at natural magicks," Cassia replied. Giles just sighed in return. 

"How about the barrier? Can you do anything about that?" he asked. 

"It's too strong. I can't get through it by myself," Cassia replied. Giles just nodded, showing that he knew that, that was the answer before Cassia spoke it. He walked over to the chair beside Willow's bed and sat down. He put his hand out to wake Willow, but it met the same kind of barrier that was around the cabin. 

"Dammit!" Giles exclaimed while standing from the chair. He grabbed the lamp that was beside him and threw it as hard as possible at Willow. The lamp shattered and the pieces flew back towards Giles. He fell backwards, trying to avoid the pieces of broken glass and plastic that were flying back towards him, but he hit his head hard on the wall and slipped into darkness. 

Spike figured that if patience was a virtue, it wasn't his. They'd been driving for what seemed like hours, and nothing had changed. Not one thing at all. They were still in the desert. There was still no sign of civilization, or life for that matter.

"Hey mate? Where we going?" Spike asked the driver. The driver just turned and looked at him then turned his head and looked out the windscreen again. After a moment, he replied, 

"You will see. The road ahead is a long way away, and when you get there, I will have to leave you, and you will have to go on, on your own. It is a hard and long journey, but eventually you shall get to your destination."

"Yeah, how can I get to my destination when I don't even know where the bleedin' hell I am?" Spike replied. It was another long moment before the driver replied.

"You will see. You will see all, once we get to the road." Spike just sighed and returned to staring out the window, and trying not to let the memories that were coming back get to him too much. 

****

Västerås – Sweden

It wasn't uncommon to see a tall, well built, blonde haired, blue eyed man walking along the docks in Västerås. However, it was uncommon to see someone walking down the docks at dusk. It was well known knowledge that no one stays down at the docks after dark for any long periods of time. The Dock area of Västerås had the highest casualty rate in Sweden. Everyone in the relatively large city thought that it was because of gangs, but Harmond knew better. He knew that the docks were the favourite hangout for the vampires of the town. For what reasons, he didn't know. Honestly, who would want to spend the twelve or so hours that they were awake at the docks? Sure, it was the largest inland port in Sweden, but that didn't mean that the vamps would have to come down here all the time. 

Harmond kept walking down the docks. Soon he came beside a large freighter ship called _The Rising Sun IV_. This was the ship he was meant to watch. His assignment was simple. Take out the vampires coming off the ship after they were sighted getting on board in Stockholm. He was to capture the one female vampire with them and take her to the Council's headquarters in Västerås, where hopefully they would get some sort of information out of her. Harmond didn't question what information they needed, that wasn't his job. He didn't have to figure out these things, just do what the Watchers Council told him to do. After all, he technically wasn't a member of the Council. He just owed them a favour, a very big favour. 

An hour passed before there was any movement. Harmond had stayed behind a large stack of crates to remain out of sight. Squinting through the darkness, Harmond saw figures moving near the railing of the _Rising Sun IV_. He counted four vamps plus the female. He saw them start to come down the gangplank, obviously weary of something. Perhaps they knew he was there, waiting to kill them. Harmond ducked down as the lead vampire stopped halfway down the gangplank and looked in his direction. 

"It's now or never," he said through his teeth, his heavy accent showing. He grabbed his crossbow out of the black sports bag he was carrying, as well as two stakes, and a short dagger that he put in the back pocket of his ski pants. He loaded the bolt into the simple crossbow, kneeled up so his torso was above the crate, took aim and fired at the group of vampires, specifically the lead one. Harmond was surprised to see that they were looking elsewhere when he fired the bolt. It was almost like they were distracted by something.

He ducked down behind the crates and loaded the crossbow again. He had missed the heart on his first shot, but he knew he wouldn't miss again. Harmond popped up above the crates, took greater aim now. The vampires were moving down the gangplank now. He pulled the trigger on the crossbow and with a twang, the bolt fired and hit the lead vampire in the heart, turning him to dust. Again, Harmond ducked down behind the crates, loaded the crossbow and fired. He hit another vampire before realising that the vampires weren't even paying any attention to him. It was like something had them spooked. Realising that this was his opportunity, Harmond ran out from behind the crates, pulled a stake out of his jacket, and rammed it into the heart of another vampire. 

That had finally caught the two remaining vampire's attention. The female and the remaining male turned to Harmond and took up a fighting stance. Harmond pulled another stake out of his jacket and held it up in front of him, ready to take them on. The male vampire charged at him, swinging as he came. Harmond easily ducked his punch and delivered his own uppercut into the vampire's midsection. As fast as he could, Harmond stood back up, grabbed the back of the vampire's head and brought it down onto his knee, breaking the vampire's nose. He swept the vampire's legs out from under him, crouched down and shoved the stake through the vampire's heart, turning him to dust.

Before he could recuperate, the female vampire had charged at him and pinned him to the ground. It was obvious that Harmond had just fought a newborn vamp, and it was obvious that this female had been around for a long time. The vampire looked down at Harmond. 

"Do you honestly think you'd be able to kill me? Do you even know who I am weak man?" she hissed at him. Her face contorted into her true vampire face, and she brought her fangs down to Harmond's neck. Before she could pierce his skin, Harmond slammed his head into the Vampire's, making the female vampire release her grip on Harmond for a split second, which was enough.

"I don't care who you are," Harmond replied. He rolled out from under the female vampire, stood up and pulled his knife out from his back pocket. Before the vampire could turn around, Harmond had sliced a deep cut across the back of the Vampire's neck, and down her back, making her loose a lot of blood. He then grabbed his handcuffs out of his jacket and put them around the vampire's hands. "You're coming with me, now." Harmond commanded. He pulled her up in front of him and began escorting her down the docks. He was very pleased with himself. He didn't even manage to get hit once. That was a rare occurrence. Usually when he got into any encounters with Vampires he'd need to rest for three days before he'd be able to walk again, and he'd taken out four vampires, and captured what looked like a very old one in ten minutes. "Wait'll the boys hear about this," he muttered to himself. He looked out to the lake that the port was on. There were a few boats out tonight, not many though. 

He heard a distant twanging sound, and when he looked back he saw a large wooden object sticking out the back of the female vampire, right around where her heart should be. He realised that it was a crossbow bolt. Before his eyes, the vampire turned to dust, and Harmond saw a dark figure standing sixty feet ahead of them on the docks, holding a crossbow up. It was too dark for Harmond to make out any features on the figure. He just knew that it was large, probably male, and had a crossbow. 

"Hey!" Harmond yelled out. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" He waited for a reply from the figure, but nothing came. He could see the figure doing something, but he was too far away, and it was too dark to see anything with detail. Harmond saw the figure raise the crossbow towards him. "Hey! I'm not a vampire!" he called out. Before he'd finished yelling, the figure shot him in the chest with the crossbow. Red hot fiery pain shot through every fibre of Harmond's body as the crossbow bolt was lodged in his chest. He fell to his knees, gripping at the bolt, trying to get it out. Then, another bolt entered his right shoulder, causing Harmond to fall onto his back. He couldn't believe how much pain there was. It was coursing through him without any barriers to stop it. He clenched his eyes shut, and when he opened them again, his vision was blurred, but he saw enough to know that the figure was standing over him, with the crossbow pointing at his head. The last sound he heard was the twang of the crossbow releasing the bolt.


	15. Chapter 14

Chapter 14

They had been waiting for a full day in anticipation. Waiting, and waiting. There was nothing else to do except wait, and that made things go even slower. Xander had no idea that a day could take so long to pass. He had spent the whole time at Buffy's house, waiting for Giles to ring back. He'd tried playing many board games, such as monopoly with Dawn, but that didn't make the time go any quicker. They'd tried watching videos, daytime T.V, listening to music, going shopping, anything. Nothing made the day go by any quicker. 

The worst thing was that three hours after Giles was meant to call, they hadn't heard from him, and Xander could see that they were all making up excuses as to why he hadn't called. They'd been going on like this for half an hour after he was meant to call them, but hadn't, it now being dusk. The most realistic excuse that they could come up with was that he just simply forgot because he was too preoccupied with other things. Not one of them, except Dawn, had, had the guts to put the most obvious reason forward; that he was trying to deal with Willow, who had gone over the edge, again. 

They were in the middle of arguing over their latest excuse; that Giles and Willow were in the middle of a ritual that they were doing, when the phone rang. Xander saw Buffy race to the phone and pick it up.

"Giles?" she said urgently into the phone. Xander watched as apprehension came over Buffy's face. "No. No, she hasn't. Why?" Xander watched as Buffy nodded. Somehow, he had the distinct feeling that it was something to do with Faith, and that it was probably the Watchers Council. "If we hear anything from her, we'll call," Buffy replied into the phone before hanging it up. Xander looked to her. "It was the Council. Saying that Faith's broken out of prison, and asking if we'd heard from her," Buffy said. 

"And how come you said no?" Xander asked. 

"We can't let the council kill her, not because they want a new slayer," Buffy replied. 

"We are talking about Faith here aren't we?" Xander said in a sarcastic voice. "This is the same woman who tried to kill you, swapped bodies with you, killed the deputy mayor, and tried to kill Angel isn't it?" 

"Yes. But Angel said a while ago that she'd changed. She turned herself in remember Xander. And if she wanted to kill me, why would she ring here for help?" Buffy replied. 

"That could be a part of her plan. Convince us all she's all better, then try to kill us again," Xander replied. 

Faith had been wondering Downtown LA for what seemed like ages now. She had checked out where Angel Investigations used to be, but it wasn't there anymore. In its place was a new office block. When she asked what had happened to the old business that was there, the secretary had just said that it had blown up. The secretary didn't know where the business had moved to, or even if it was still open or not. Faith had asked her if she knew of any places to stay, and she kindly gave Faith directions to a home that takes in teenagers off the street. Faith didn't really care if she looked like she was off the street. It was a given that she'd look a bit tattered after just breaking out of jail. What Faith was surprised at though was that the secretary or the guy that had given her a lift seemed to notice that Faith was in a prisoner's uniform. 

Dusk had come before Faith had even found the street the home was in. She had tried to look up one of the maps that were in the phone books in all the public phones, but all the phone books had been taken. By the time Faith had actually found the home, night had fallen. 

The place looked pretty good, to Faith's standards, which wasn't saying much. She was used to staying in run down motels and any other cheap places she could find. As she walked up the front steps, she could hear loud rap music coming from inside the building. 

"Just like home," Faith said to herself under her breath. She knocked on the door and waited. There was no answer. She knocked on the door again, but still no answer. This time, she pounded on the door. Still no answer. Faith opened the door slowly and saw a short blonde girl walking towards her. For one second, she thought it was Buffy, but after her initial shock, she realised that it wasn't. 

"Hi. Are you looking for a place to stay," The girl asked Faith. 

"Yeah," Faith replied, while looking around. 

"As you can see we're pretty full here. I don't know if there's any room, sorry," the girl said. 

"I won't take up much room, and I won't be here for long. Just have to find a friend. I'll be out most of the night too. All I need is a place to crash," Faith replied. The girl looked at Faith for a moment, then replied,

"You're not from around here, are you?" 

"No, I'm not… why?" Faith replied.

"You can't go out after nine. It's not safe. Especially for young women," the girl replied, almost like she was hinting at something. 

"Don't worry. I can handle myself," Faith replied.

"There's been plenty of people who've said that too, and they've never come back," the blonde replied. "Just know that it isn't safe after dark," she cautiously said. 

Anne was wondering what she was going to do with the brunette standing before her. She couldn't really turn her away, but they were full. The brunette looked like she'd been through a rough time. Her hair was all tangled up and scruffy, and the brunette looked dog tired. There was also something in her eyes that gave off the impression the girl had seen too many things she wasn't meant to see. There were always people who had that look in her home these days. Anne thought it was because of all the vampires running the streets, preying on young kids. 

She was just about to tell the brunette that she could stay if she could find some room when there was a knock on the door. She walked past Faith and opened the door. There was a young man standing on the front step, looking like he'd seen a ghost. 

"Y-y-you have to help me… I-I was chased, down the street. T-there were about four of them. I-I don't know if they followed me or not," he stammered. 

"Sure, sure, come in," Anne replied. She stepped aside and allowed the man to enter. She looked over to Faith who looked at her and nodded at the young man who had just stumbled in the doorway. Anne guessed that Faith was happy to wait until she'd gotten the man settled. Anne saw Faith turn away and look at one of the pictures that was on the wall. Anne turned her attention back to the young man, "Just tell me what happened?" she asked. 

"I-I was walking down the street… I go this place to stay, you know. I was heading there. Then, these guys came out of an alleyway and started talking about food or something, and then they chased me… I think I lost them on the way here," he replied, obviously calming down. 

"Tell me, what did they look like?" Anne asked him, "Did they have anything wrong with their faces?"

"Yeah," the man replied. Anne looked to Faith, who was still looking at the pictures on the wall. She looked back to the man, and in horror, realised that his face had changed. His brow had protruded, and small little fangs had sprouted in his mouth. "They looked something like this," he said. Before anything could happen, he lunged at her and pushed her over onto the ground. She looked up at him in terror, not knowing what to do. She knew that she'd frozen, and there was nothing she could do about it. The vampire had his mouth open and was bringing his mouth down to her neck. Anne just closed her eyes as last thoughts went screaming through her head. 

However, no piercing pain came. She could feel his weight leave her body and heard a loud crash. She opened her eyes and saw the vampire scrambling to get up off the floor beside her. She saw a figure above her, and saw that it was the young brunette girl. She was offering out her hand to help Anne up. She gladly took the brunette's hand and was pulled up suprisingly fast. The brunette _kindly_ pushed her out of the way and stood facing the vampire. Anne was lost; she didn't know what was happening. She saw the vampire get up and look at the brunette girl. Anne started to call out as the vampire charged at the brunette, but stopped when she saw the brunette duck under the vampire's punch, and uppercut it in the chest. She watched the brunette step back then grab the back of the vampire's shirt and slam him into the door. The brunette picked him up off the floor onto his feet and dodged his poor attempts to attack her. She pummelled his chest then brought her fist hard into his cheek. There was a loud crack as his jaw broke. The brunette kicked his legs out from under him, but not before the vampire managed to hit her in the chest. The brunette stumbled back a bit, and looked around. Anne realised she was looking for a stake, and she knew that she had one nearby. She opened the drawer of the small wall unit that was nearby and found what she was looking for. She threw the stake to the brunette, who whipped it out of the air and plunged it into the vampire's heart. Before them, the vampire turned to dust, leaving a neat little mess on the floor. 

"Told you I could handle myself," the brunette said while handing the stake back to Anne. Anne watched as the brunette looked around the room at everyone that was watching. Anne knew that most of them had had a run in with a vampire in their young lives, but none of them handled themselves with the confidence the brunette did. "I'm Faith, by the way," she said holding out her hand to Anne. 

"Anne," she heard herself reply.

"So, I'm guessing I can stay then?"

__

She was in a forest. No sign of civilisation around her. From the size of the oak, pine, and redwood trees around her, she guessed that the forest was ancient. To her right, a small gazelle looked up at her, and then darted off into the underbrush. She looked up and barely saw through the tops of the gigantic trees that it was a nice sunny day, although she could hardly tell from her position. She closed her eyes and just stood there, letting everything take her over. She could hear the sounds of the forest; the birds singing, the cicadas and crickets chirping. Apart from that, and her own breathing, there was silence. Suddenly, she was overpowered with emotion. The feeling was tremendous in scale, and although the feeling scared her, she liked it. Inside her, she felt at peace, as if this was the way it was meant to be. The girl then remembered that this is how it had felt before. Her mind was screaming out to her that there was something she was forgetting, but she couldn't 'put her finger on it'. 

Soon, the feeling left, and she was swamped with the same emotion again. She knew it was because she was connected. She could feel the force of life around her, feel the way it was all connected together, and that she was apart of that. It felt so right, proper, like this was her place. Images flashed through her brain of something else that had felt this right before, but again, she couldn't put her finger on it. It had something to do with people, that much she knew. She also knew that the feeling she was experiencing now was purely because she was away from society and all the mess that comes with human beings. She was above them now. She was pure, untainted by the human hand, having escaped all that. 

When she opened her eyes, she was standing in perfect circular clearing. The floor was blanketed with dead and decaying leaves. Above her, she could see the blue sky, and the sun shining straight down at her.

But then something came over her. Everything wasn't all good. Everything didn't feel right. She came to realise that she was only a human, just like the rest of them. She knew that she was one of the few people to reach the state she was just in, and she also realised that she had never comprehended the true meaning to the things around her before; that she had tried to control that which was not hers, or anyone's, to control. She knew that by trying to do so, it had completely consumed her, in all the wrong ways. She couldn't remember what had happened before, but she knew that there was great pain, all caused because of her. She remembered being intensely insecure, until she found out about this. Then, something else happened, that fixed everything. She lived completely happily for a few years, then she remembered that she took whatever that had come along for granted, and then everything went downhill until where she was now.

All of a sudden, everything snapped back to normal. She realised that something_ was showing her these things; telling her even. Now, she listened. _

In an instant, she knew that she had a second chance, but that this chance wasn't to be taken lightly. She somehow knew that if she got anything wrong this time, she, and everyone else, would ultimately be far more worse off than now. 

She looked around, trying to find some clue of the thing that was telling her these things, but there was nothing. She knew that it was communicating to her on the most basic level. Beyond language. She was shown feelings, and whatever was bringing these up also brought up her own feelings. Without even knowing what was happening, she was granted with knowledge of what she had done wrong, exactly, beyond the human brain's understanding, but she knew that it wasn't beyond the soul's understanding. 

"Who are you?" she called out, curious. "Can you show yourself to me?" She knew that whatever she was communicating with was going to show itself to her even before she spoke it. Patiently, she waited, but nothing came. "Are you going to show yourself?" Patiently, she waited again, but nothing. As soon as she closed her eyes to sense for a presence of anything, she felt something coming towards her, through the forest. She could feel that the thing coming towards her was familiar, too familiar. She turned in the direction it was coming from and opened her eyes. 

She couldn't believe what she saw as memories from her life flashed back to her. This was the love of her life coming towards her. The one person that she honestly couldn't care more for. The one person who had come back into her life only to be violently ripped from life. She watched as the heavenly blue eyes locked with hers as the girl entered the clearing. 

"The answers are right in front of you. You just have to look in the right place… You know what you have to do… You know what I'm talking about. Those who seem to aid you will be your downfall, and those that you know aid you will be your upbringing. You just have to see yourself, know your limits, and then, everything will be perfect," The girl said. "Clarity perceived is not clarity believed. Heed these words" The girl turned and started to go.

"NO! You can't go!"

"I will come back, and you will guide me back, but I am not who you think I am. Moreover heed these words" the girl laid her hand on her head and everything felt good. Nothing felt bad, and it felt as though nothing would ever be bad again. "Remember, I'm always there if you need me. You just have to know who to ask." The girl then shimmered into nothingness. 

Around her, the scenery shifted to that of the forest she was in before, without the clearing. She was ultimately confused, even though she felt as though everything was clearer than they'd ever been in her life. 

Giles and Cassia were still trapped in the cabin by the coven's spells. A few minutes after Giles had woken up he and Cassia had tried a spell to get through the barrier surrounding the cabin, but to no avail. They both knew that it was pointless, but they had to try. From then, Giles had spent the rest of the time trying to figure out if his fears were feasible. 

"Cassia?" Giles asked.

"Yes?" she replied.

"Why do you think the coven is keeping us and Willow in here?" Giles asked from his chair beside Willow's bed. 

"I don't know. I think I believe them in saying that they want to protect themselves until Willow gets better," she replied. Giles nodded at her response. He took off his glasses and cleaned them before asking his next question. 

"Do you honestly believe that?" It was a while before Cassia replied,

"No."

"What do you believe then?" Giles asked, wanting to know if she was thinking along the same lines as he was. 

"I don't know," Cassia replied. Giles looked at the girl for a moment. He could tell that she honestly didn't know. 

"Cassia. I know you've been with the coven for a while-" Giles started.

"I only come in when I can. I'm here now because they asked me to be here for Willow's recovery, seeing that I'm good with the natural magicks and all. I think they wanted me to teach her," Cassia replied, babbling a bit. It was obvious she was nervous about something. 

"I think that the coven has, uhh, ill intentions towards Willow," Giles said after a moment.

"What do you mean by that?" Cassia asked. Giles just sighed. 

"I think the coven wants to keep Willow here until they can find out a way to completely drain her of her power and use it for their own purposes," Giles said. 

"Yeah, I could see that happening," Cassia said. Giles just furrowed his brow when Cassia said that. 

"Why could you see that happening?" Giles asked. 

"I don't know, I just could," Cassia replied, shrugging. Giles turned to the bed when he heard a noise from Willow. It appeared as if she was waking. He saw Cassia walk towards her, and he did the same. When they both got by her bedside, her eyes shot open. 

"Willow? Are you alright?" Giles asked. She just ignored him and got out of bed. She walked to the door, opened it, and went to step through the doorway but she was met by a barrier. She extended her hand out and the air around it wavered. "Willow?" She turned around and faced Giles,

"It's alright Giles. I know what to do," Willow replied softly. Giles was concerned about Willow. It seemed as though something in her had changed, and Giles didn't know if it was for the best. "Samantha. Show yourself," Willow said into the room. "Montague. Come here now." To Giles, it was almost as if she was demanding their presence. "Show yourselves now!" Giles saw her look around the room. He didn't know if Willow was any better yet. "Show yourselves!" Willow screamed. Again, nothing happened. "By the powers of earth and water, air and fire, I call upon Samantha and Montague to appear before me. Let me see them before me now," Willow said with her head bowed and eyes closed. In front of her Giles saw two figures start to materialise out of nowhere. Soon, Montague and Samantha were before them.

"What is the meaning of this? How did you do that?" Samantha queried a little too hastily. 

"I think it would be in your best interests if you let us go," Willow replied. "I'm not staying here. You can't and won't help me." 

"How do you know that? We just tried once and something went wrong," Montague replied. "Surely we can try again." 

"It won't work. You can't do anything. I demand you release us, now," Willow said, anger clearly evident in her voice. 

"I'm sorry, but we won't do that," Samantha said. "You're apart of a bigger picture Willow. One that you can't understand. It may seem we are being cruel, but in the long run, we are doing the right thing," Samantha replied. 

"By keeping us here? I mean, I think I understand why you want me here, but why Giles and Cassia?" Willow asked.

"You don't see the big picture Willow. You never have. We have to prepare for what's coming," Samantha replied. 

"And what is coming?" Giles heard himself ask. Samantha looked exhausted from the confrontation and she looked to Montague. For the first time, Giles saw that Samantha looked remarkably older than what he had first thought.

"Something big," Samantha replied. 

"We don't really know," Montague said at the same time. It was evident to Giles that both Samantha and Montague were lying. There was a long silence as Willow, who was obviously in charge, thought about what to do. Calmer now, she said;

"Fine then. We'll compromise." Both Montague and Samantha looked at her. "You can't leave until we do," Willow said, faking a smile at the two of them.


	16. Chapter 15

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Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and Co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.

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Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)

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Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 rumoured spoilers (I'm not looking at all the spoilers for Season 7)

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Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15+ on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older). 

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Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not). Some 'people' from Spike's past as a human might be involved as well. 

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Authors Note: Thanks for the reviews…

This is a big chapter…. Lots of big important things happen…. Rememeber, you don't have to understand what's going on. It'll all be explained over time!

  
Thanks again for the reviews… more would be rrrreeeeeeaaallllllllyyyyy good 

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Chapter 15

The gang at the Summers' house had decided that they all needed to find out a way to contact Giles in England. They didn't have a number to call, and they didn't have anyone they knew to call to get Giles, and they didn't have the number of the coven. 

Night had fallen, and the best thing Buffy had decided to do was to go patrolling. Unfortunately, she didn't know what she was going out and getting herself into at the time. She left her house at around ten, confident that the night would be fairly quiet and nothing major would happen. She was wrong about that. 

Buffy was walking down one of the many back streets of Sunnydale, heading to her favourite cemetery, cursing because she didn't know of any normal people who would have a favourite cemetery. When she was just about there, six figures came running out of the cemetery, oblivious to Buffy's presence. She could instantly tell that they were vampires and that they were running from something. 

Buffy half concealed herself behind a nearby hedge, watching to see what was going to happen. A couple of moments later, the group of vampires stopped. Buffy saw five more vampires coming down the street, heading for the group. They joined up with the group, and stood looking into the cemetery. Buffy was wondering what was going on. It was early in the night, and these vampires looked like they'd been in the fight of their lives. A couple of moments later, another group of vampires came out of the graveyard. It was obvious to Buffy that the first group had been running from the second group. The second group had nine in their ranks, and they all carried some sorts of swords or long daggers. Buffy watched as the groups faced off. She could tell that they were viciously saying something to each other, but from her distance she couldn't tell what, and she wasn't going to risk getting closer. She couldn't take on twenty vamps on her own, no matter how good she was. 

In the next moment, the vampires attacked each other. Buffy stood behind the hedge, amused. 

"If this keeps up, I'll be out of work," Buffy said as the first vampire was dusted. "Good." She watched as the vampires fought each other, the ones with swords winning. She heard a rustling sound behind her, and spun around to see three vampires behind her. They were obviously reinforcements for one of the groups, and from the large swords Buffy could see in their hands, she could tell which group. "The big vampire fight's over there," Buffy said while pointing behind her. 

"We don't want to fight them. We want you," one of the vampires replied. 

"Heard the blood of a Slayer's pretty good," another one replied. Buffy recognised the other vampire as one of the ones that had gotten away the night she had taken Dawn out on her first patrol. She knew that he was stronger than ordinary vampires, and guessed the other two were as well. 

"Fine then. If you're going to kill me, can you at least tell me what this whole _vamp vs. vamp_ thing is about," Buffy said sarcastically, knowing that it wouldn't work. The first vampire lunged at her, swinging his sword for her neck, and Buffy easily ducked it and rammed her fist into his midsection. She grabbed the vampire by the sides of his leather duster and using her momentum and his weight, she pulled herself up and rammed her knee into his chest as he was doubled over, sending him flipping onto his back on the ground. She didn't have time to try and recover the sword from him before the other two attacked. One of them had circled around behind her, and the other one was in front of her. The one behind Buffy attacked first, and she sidestepped his attack, spun around and delivered a roundhouse kick to his hip. She then grabbed the hand his sword was in and twisted the whole arm around, making him drop the sword. She kneed him in the guts and then threw him into the other vampire, which was coming at her, sending them both to the ground. She picked up the sword and faced off against the original vampire which had attacked her. He swung the sword at her midsection, and Buffy easily blocked it. She faked to swing right and spun around and took off the vampire's head easily, turning him to dust. The other two were struggling to get up, and Buffy decapatated them too. To Buffy, it was far to easy. Any normal vampire would have been harder to kill than that, and she knew that at least one of them was stronger than a normal vampire. She just shrugged it off to luck. 

Buffy then remembered the fight that was happening between the vampires in the street and the entrance to the cemetery. A lot of vampires had been dusted, and there were about ten left, all fighting each other. 

All of a sudden, vampires started dusting everywhere. Buffy could hear something like a rubber band being fired. Then she heard it again, and again. With each sound, another vampire turned to dust before her. She looked at the area surrounding the vampires, but couldn't see anything. Then, three dark shadowy figures came out of the cemetery, each holding crossbows. Buffy could see the figures were tall, and fast. They had dark hooded robes on, and they seemed to shine even though there was hardly any light around to reflect off of the robes. 

The vampires instantly knew that the dark shadowy figures were a threat and turned to face them. Buffy's slayer senses were going off the scale as the shadowy figures moved towards the vampires, almost seeming to float off the ground. She watched as the dark figures took out two long knives each and moved at lightning speed towards the vampires. She watched as the first vampire, one with a sword, attacked the first hooded figure. He swung downwards towards the figure's head, but with lightning speed, the figure sidestepped it, stepped forward so it was beside the vampire as it was swinging it's sword, and cut it's head off easily and swiftly. It was attacked by two more vampires and it spun backwards out of the way. In the same lightning quick speed, it ducked under one of the vampire's swords, and deep cuts appeared across the vampire's torso, obviously the knife had been there. The rest of the tall hooded figures caught up with the first one, and in a matter of seconds, all the vampires were piles of dust. 

Buffy stared, awestricken. She couldn't look away. She had never seen anything move like those figures just had. Three of them had taken apart ten vampires in a matter of seconds, and not one of them had even been touched. She stared at their robes, wondering what kind of creatures they were. Her brain was refusing to take in what she had just seen, and she was frozen in place. She snapped out of her shock-stricken state when she realised that the figures were moving, but she almost completely froze in place when she realised that they were moving towards her. 

__

"How could they know I'm here. I've been silent and been hiding behind the bush," Buffy thought. She knows how they knew she was there, and right now, she didn't care. Everything in her was telling her to run, and run she did. She knew what the shadowy figures wanted at that exact moment; her dead. 

As Buffy was running back through the streets of Sunnydale, it occurred to her that this was the first time since Glory had learnt that Dawn was the key, that she had ever run from a fight, and she didn't like the feeling. She had run four blocks before she turned around to see if the figures were following her. She was greatly relieved when she didn't see any of them behind her. She stopped running and turned around to face the way she had just come, making sure that there was nothing following her. She then noticed she still had the sword in her hand, and she was thankful. Buffy took in her surroundings. She was on the footpath of one of the main streets in Sunnydale. To her right was a large brick wall, and to her left was the street, obviously. She then realised that she was beside the rather large, for a small town, department store called Target. To say that Buffy was spooked was an understatement. She just had this gut feeling that something was watching her, and she knew that it was one of the hooded figures. Just then, a hand came down hard on Buffy's shoulder. 

****

Västerås – Sweden; Watchers Council HQ

Michelle had been in the office all day and she desperately wanted to get home, but she had to wait until one of the field agents came and reported in. She liked working at the Watchers Council's Sweden branch. She had been raised by her father, who was fairly well known and respected in the Watchers Council. She really didn't have any sort of connection with her father though. When she was growing up, her father had always been preoccupied with his Slayer than her. She kenw that Watchers weren't meant to have children, but her father was an exception, only due to his skills as a Watcher. She remembered being there for her Father when his Slayer died, he was devestated. Her mind wondered back to the time before her father had a Slayer, and all the things that her and her father had done together. 

"Michelle?" she heard. She slightly jumped back in her seat, startled at the voice. She looked up and saw the man she had been waiting for. 

"Howard! Don't do that," she exclaimed. 

"Sorry, it looked like you were off with the faeries," Howard replied. 

"Sorry, I was just thinking about things, that's all," Michelle replied. "Didn't hear you come in," she added. 

"That's okay. Didn't mean to startle you," he replied. Michelle just smiled at him. 

"So, how'd everything go?" Michelle asked. 

"Fine. I took the female vampire into the holding cells already. You can call and check it up if you want. I had to kill the other vampires though," Howard replied. Michelle just nodded. 

"Good, now I can get out of here," she said. She turned around and gathered up her things. When she turned back around, Howard was gone. It was strange that she couldn't remember hearing the doors open or close. She just shrugged it off. 

****

An Hour Earlier; Västerås – Sweden; Watchers Council HQ

Rhonny was startled to hear shouting from outside. He quickly jumped up and ran to the window. Under the lights outside, he could see someone being restrained, with someone else holding them. 

"Open up hey. It might be a good idea!" the person shouted from outside. Rhonny ran around to the controls and opened up the large roller door which was the main entrance to the warehouse that had the holding cells in it. He watched as the man brought in a vampire, restrained. "I'm Howard. Name should be on the list," the man said. Rhonny looked at the list and saw that a Howard was due to bring in a vampire for holding and interrogation tonight. He nodded and showed Howard a large cage in which he was to put the vampire. They both walked over to the cage and Howard asked Rhonny to open it for him, as he was preoccupied with the vampire. Rhonny did as he was asked, not suspicious of anything. Howard shoved the vampire into the cage and then got Rhonny to close the door to the cage and put a very large padlock on it. 

"I'll just need for you to sign a couple of forms," Rhonny said to Howard. 

"Sorry, no can do. I've really got to go. I don't have time, sorry. I'll do it tomorrow," Howard replied. Rhonny just looked at him, not liking that he was going to get in trouble for Howard not signing the forms. "Listen. I'll come in first thing tomorrow and sign the forms, that way, no one will know I didn't do it now," Howard said to him. 

"Okay, fine," Rhonny replied, not knowing that in the morning there would be a police report of a body down at the docks, and that that body would be Howard's. 

Buffy spun around, grabbed the neck of whatever was behind her, shoved it hard against the wall, and raised her sword to it's head. It was a certainty that if it was a human behind her, their neck would be crushed by now. 

"Buffy! Are you crazy! It's me!" Anya screamed. Realising this, Buffy released her grip on Anya and lowered her sword. 

"Anya. What are you doing?" Buffy asked. 

"I _was_ walking down the street until a certain Vampire Slayer tried to kill me," Anya sarcastically replied. "What's up with you?"

"Oh. Um, nothing. Just saw some stuff I was pretty sure I didn't need to see," Buffy replied, looking around. "Big guys in dark shiny cloaks killing ten vampires in about ten seconds," Buffy added. Anya just nodded in reply. They started walking down the street, Buffy telling Anya things that had happened since she'd left a couple of days earlier, and Anya telling Buffy all of her 'vengeance demon' stories. 

It didn't take long for Faith to find a bit of room at the shelter. She put her things down, which weren't much, and spent the rest of the night answering questions that most of the kids had as to how she took the vampire out so easily. She learned that most of the kids were, or had been, members of a gang that hunted vampires in this area, so most of them knew the basics about vampires. She didn't tell them that she was a Slayer though, she didn't want to give that away. Her cover story was that she'd grown up knowing about Vampires and therefore knew how to handle herself well against them. 

She spent most of the day scouting out the local area, getting to know the 'lay of the land' although there wasn't much 'land' around. It was mostly concrete sidewalks and bitumen streets. She'd spent a good part of the day looking for Angel Investigations. It didn't seem too hard to find at first. Just look up the phone book for the address and then look up a street directory to find out where to go. However there was only a phone number for Angel Investigations in the phone book, and she'd spent most of the day ringing the number, but no one was answering. 

When night fell, she decided that she might actually try and live up to her name as the Vampire Slayer and go patrolling. It certainly looked like those kids in the shelter needed some help around the area, and what better than to have a Vampire Slayer hunting at night. Faith had asked some of the kids of the areas to stay away from, in hope that they'd tell her so she could go patrolling in those areas and cut the vampire population down. The most feared area now was the docks. According to the kids, some strange stuff had gone down there a couple of months earlier, and now it was a haven for all kinds of nasties. Faith thanked them, and then went to Anne to get a stake from her before heading out. 

When Faith arrived at the dock area, there wasn't much activity. From what she could tell, there hadn't been any vamps in the area for a decent amount of time. She was just about to give up when she looked down the beach and saw a group of people moving along the beach suspiciously. She followed them, staying at least seventy metres behind them. She saw them enter a cave that was etched into the cliffs at the end of the beach, and she followed them. 

Faith reached the entrance to the cave and looked inside, keeping herself hidden. There were four vampires in total, and they were all standing around in a circle, preparing for a ritual obviously. Faith grabbed her stake out of the back of her pants and charged into the cave, staking one vampire as she entered. 

Ten minutes later, Faith emerged out of the cave. She had a large bruise on her right arm, and a busted up lip that was already starting to heal. She made her way over to the beach and started up the slope. She was halfway up the slope when she noticed a figure standing at the top of the embankment twenty metres down looking out to the ocean. As soon as she looked at him, her Slayer senses told her that he was dangerous. 

Faith approached him, figuring he was a companion to the vampires she had just slain. She crept up behind him, hoping to get the jump on him before he realised she was there. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. When Faith was about five metres away from him, he spun around and faced her. 

"You should know it's stupid to try and sneak up on me," he said to Faith. 

"Oh well, had to try. It's easier to kick your ass without you knowing I'm here," Faith replied. With that, the young man ran at Faith and struck out. From the speed and force of the blow, Faith definitely figured he was a vampire. The blow hit her across the face, and sent her head snapping to the side. He was about to hit out again, but Faith blocked the blow. She tried to hit him with her other arm, but he blocked the blow. Faith went to punch him in the head, but he caught her wrist. With her wrist above her head, Faith ducked down, moved towards the vamp, and delivered, and uppercut to the stomach area before springing up and kneeing him in the same place as hard as she could. She was surprised when the vamp was still standing. Any blow like that would have knocked an ordinary vampire to the ground, but it only caused this one to double over. She got a quick look at his face, and was surprised to see that he hadn't morphed into full vamp face yet. He recovered quickly and went to deliver a snap-kick to Faith's head, but she caught his foot an inch or two before it hit her face. Suddenly, in an instant, the kid was off the ground spinning, his other foot approaching Faith's head. He was using her grip on his foot as an anchor to something in order to kick her head in. With nothing else she could do, Faith released the kid's foot and threw herself to the ground. Her and the young man that she was fighting stood up and faced off at the same time. "You're good," Faith said to him while looking at him. She was pleased to see that he looked fairly hurt from the couple of blows she had managed to deliver to him. She also knew herself that she was worn out and couldn't keep this up for long. She put up the façade that she was barely tired, and saw it register on the kid's face. She knew that he knew that Faith wasn't going to give up, and with that, the kid slowly started to back away. Faith wasn't going to let him get away that easily, she at least wanted to know what he was. "Hey!" Faith screamed. "We're not done yet." 

Faith ran at him and tackled him to the ground. Quickly, he shoved her off of him and got up again. 

"Fine, you want to fight. We'll fight," he replied. This time, he came at Faith with everything he had. Faith was surprised at the skill, strength and speed of the teenager she was facing. Faith finally saw an opening in his attacks and attacked back. She quickly brought him down to the ground, but not before hearing approaching footsteps. She was kneeling down on his chest with her hand around his throat. 

"Get off him, now!" she heard a voice say menacingly. She looked up and saw a young bald black man standing above her holding a really large, wicked looking axe. Behind her, a girl approached holding a crossbow pointed at Faith. 

"Why should I?" Faith replied calmly. She could tell that these two were just people, unlike the teenager she was holding to the ground. She looked down at the kid and snapped her head up when she heard the growl of a vampire. She saw six vampires behind the bald man and the girl. "Shit," she whispered under her breath. In an instant she got up and raced past the bald man and the girl into the vampires. She was glad to see that the girl had already spun around and was aiming the crossbow at some of the vampires. Faith ran at the vampires, stake in hand. It was the same stake that Anne had given her at the shelter. It wasn't until Faith had finished fighting the vampires that she'd realised that no one was there helping her. Sure, the girl had dusted a couple of vampires with the crossbow, but soon after she'd stopped. 

"What are you?" the boy Faith'd been fighting before asked. 

"You're asking me? What the hell are you?" Faith replied, her temperament stretched to the limit.

"There's three of us, and one of you," the bald man added, "you go first." 

"Okay, fine. I'm Faith… the vampire Slayer. You are?" she said, looking at the boy.

"You're Faith?" the bald man exclaimed. 

"Yeah, who're you?" Faith replied. She wasn't expecting the bald man to ready his axe and the girl to raise her crossbow. 

"What are you doing out of jail," The girl asked, hiding behind her crossbow. 

"How do you know me? And that's none of your business," Faith replied. 

"We're friends of Angel," the bald man said.

"Angel? You're friends of Angel? Where is he?" Faith replied. 

"He's due to come here any minute now," the boy said to Faith. She could tell that he was lying. It was obvious that they didn't want her to make any trouble, so that's why the boy said that Angel wasn't too far away. 

"Look. I'm not going to hurt any of you. I just need to talk to Angel, like right now," Faith replied. "I didn't break out of prison… well, not exactly. I only broke out because the Watchers Council's gonna kill me to get another Slayer," Faith explained, "I don't want to hurt anyone right now." The girl and the bald man lowered their weapons, only slightly though. 

"Angel's… missing," the girl said. "We're out searching for him."

"Come on, how long's he been gone?" Faith replied. 

"A couple of months," The boy replied, disinterested.


	17. Chapter 16

Disclaimers: All characters here are owned by Joss Whedon and Co. They are in no way mine, and there is going to be no profit made from this story, except for my personal enjoyment.

Distribution: Anywhere, just tell me where it's going, and give me credit (The-Aussie-Witch)

Spoilers: Season 6, and some Season 7 spoilers

Rating: PG-13 because of violence and language, and because there is no M-15 on Fanfiction.net (An Australian Rating standing for Mature Audiences, fifteen and older).

Summary: starts straight from the minute Grave left off! I am not a Spike and Buffy 'shipper' and I'm not sure if things will be right between those two as of yet (Maybe, maybe not).

Timeframe: After season 6, as stated, but I will gradually skip over Season 7 and go into AU, similar to Season 7, but not very… the basic ideas are similar, but BIGGER

Authors Note: Got the last chapter of this up, check my author profile for the Sequel coming out soon! I didn't intend to do this, but I'm doing it now, cause once again, I got a different idea where to take this story.

Chapter 16

Once he regained consciousness, he tried to look around at his surroundings. Nothing he saw was familiar to him. He could see that he was in some type of cavern, as he was surrounded by rock, and there was sunlight coming in from an entrance not too far away. He was chained up against the wall, arms outstretched beside him. Roger struggled to stay awake as his eyes drooped. He knew that he shouldn't feel tired, but he did. Soon, a figure in a red hooded robe entered the cavern, carrying two large glass jars, a small glass jar, and a knife. Roger knew something about the mystical world, and he knew that the large glass jars were each a _mòping_, a jar for storage of mystical energy, impervious to magick. What they were for, he didn't know. He saw that the small glass jar was just an ordinary everyday jar, and Roger took one guess what it's purpose was for: to store his blood. That would explain the knife as well.

"Let me go. The Watchers Council of England will not accept the murder of one of their watchers," Roger said to the red robed figure. It just ignored him and continued on with it's work. It started chanting a language Roger had never heard of before, and slowly, a flat circular area raised itself up out of the ground. There was a large outer circle, almost like a border, and a smaller inner circle with a penticle (5 pointed star) engraved in it. The circular platform stood half a foot above the ground. The hooded figure walked over to the middle of the penticle and knelt, facing Roger. He started chanting something unintelligible to Roger, and a pale yellow circle of energy formed around the outside of the platform. In a second, Roger felt a great pain in his chest, and saw that the hooded figure was now standing before him, holding the knife sticking out of his chest. Roger felt a hot fiery sensation spreading around his body, and knew that he was going to die of blood loss. In the last moments of his life, he thought he saw a figure, low to the ground which almost looked like a caveman, with painted stripes entering the cave…

Somewhere in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Los Angeles

Captain Ricketts was sitting on the back of his boat with a line in. He hadn't been successful in catching anything yet. Well, personally he hadn't been successful in catching anything, but he and his crew aboard the _White Celeste_, a fishing trawler out of San Diego had fulfilled there required quota for the week and were going to head back into shore as soon as the first light. He was startled when he saw a large amount of big bubbles on the surface of the water only ten metres away. He thought it was just nothing and went back to his fishing rod. Even though he was a commercial fisherman aboard a fishing trawler, he didn't mind putting the odd line in every now and then.

He had been sitting there for another twenty minutes without even a bite. He was just about to get up and put the rod away when he sensed someone standing behind him. He turned around and saw that it was not one of his crew. He was soaked to the bone, and looked terrible. Worse of all, there was something horribly wrong with his face. He didn't get the chance for a closer look as the person, if that what it could be called, grabbed him around the neck and sank his teeth into it. Captain Ricketts put up as much of a fight as possible, but he wasn't strong enough. He just had enough time to see one of his crewmates lying on the table inside the boat before he blacked out.

Spike felt a sudden surge of energy enter his body. He didn't know what to do, and didn't know what was causing it. He could see that the driver slammed on the brakes and was checking over him. He couldn't help but smirk as the energy was going through him as the driver muttered "shit" under his breath.

After it was over however, Spike had felt like he'd lost something of his, a part of him, and he had a sneaking suspicion in the back of his mind of what it was.

Meanwhile in Sunnydale, California

Xander didn't know what he was going to do about Anya. He felt extremely guilty over leaving her at the altar and what had happened after that. He put up the visage that he was fairly alright with it now, but he wasn't. It was eating away at him like nothing he'd ever felt before. He felt like the world's most horrible person for that, and what's worse, he knew that it might be right. Every now and then, a little voice would pop into his head and say 'of course that's not true, it can't be', but that voice was there only every now and then. Overall, he felt horrible, like he couldn't keep on with his life. Granted, he wasn't going to commit suicide, no matter what he did, but some days, he felt like it. He knew that it must be worse for Anya though, well, when she was human anyway. He figured that's why she went and got turned back into a vengeance demon again.

On top of all of that was the worry about Willow. His Willow. What she was going through in England. The last phone call from Giles hadn't sounded too good, and he knew that something must be wrong as he didn't call back as he said he would. He wanted to get over there as soon as possible. If it were up to him, he'd be on the next flight out of Sunnydale and he'd be heading straight for England, but unfortunately, it wasn't that easy.

Dawn could tell that there was something troubling her sister as she slept. Dawn herself had been trying to sleep, but it wouldn't come as she heard thumping and loud sounds through the wall. Frustrated, she had stormed out of her room to Buffy's, and when she opened the door, she saw her sister thrashing about on the bed, a look of distress on her face. Dawn had tried to wake Buffy up, but nothing had worked. She'd tried shaking her, and yelling in her ear. She had even splashed cold water on her, but nothing worked. At the moment she was contemplating what else she could do to wake her sister up, or to call Xander and see what he could do. She decided to call Xander because she'd run out of ideas short of causing her sister physical pain.

It was a hot day, and the sun burnt down with it's full ferocity. Buffy could feel her skin burning only after five minutes. She recognised this place, she'd been here before, but she couldn't place her finger on it. Looking around, she saw a place for a fire, and that it had recently been lit as smoke was still wafting its way up out of the smouldering ashes. There was a large log turned over obviously to sit on, and she could just see that there was something on the other side of it. Buffy walked over to the log and looked at the ground. There were sharp sticks assembled along the ground in a row: stakes. Buffy immediately recognised where she was. This was where she had met the First Slayer, a cave woman with the powers of the Slayer. Buffy turned around, looking for her, but couldn't find any trace of the creature. From what Buffy could remember, the First Slayer was far from what she in her day would call a person, but Buffy didn't see it that way. There were obviously things she didn't know, and couldn't know about the time that the First Slayer inhabited. She caught a movement behind a large pile of boulders that looked like they had been picked up and placed there. Slowly and cautiously Buffy crept forward to the boulders, unsure of what she would find.

A noise behind her caused Buffy to spin around. She saw Angel standing behind her, looking around at his surroundings, taking everything in. She also saw something else. She saw the First Slayer, crouched behind the log where the stakes were. In an instant, the First Slayer sprang up and raced towards Angel. Buffy could see that there was a stake in her hand, and before she knew what was happening, a pointed end was sticking out through Angel's chest, the First Slayer holding it at her back.

"ANGEL!!! NO!!!" Buffy yelled. Buffy charged towards him, grabbing at him as he started to turn to dust. It seemed to take a lifetime for it to happen, but when it did, Buffy knew that he was gone and collapsed onto the ground. Buffy looked up at the First Slayer, obvious confusion, pain, anger, and hurt in her eyes. "What did you do," she whispered, not able to speak the words. The First Slayer just replied;

"What was needed to be done.. Not everything is as it should be." Buffy didn't seem to listen to her words, and got up and sprung at the First Slayer. The Fist Slayer grabbed Buffy, and using her momentum, threw Buffy over herself onto her back, behind the First Slayer. Before Buffy could get up, she was hit by a series of images.

She saw Angel standing in a large warehouse, with Wesley kneeling before him, barely conscious. He snapped Wesley's neck without hesitation.

Next, she saw herself fighting vampires in Sunnydale, and barely winning. She could sense from the vision that it was a big fight, one with importance. And the vampires didn't look like they were the normal vampires of Sunnydale.

She saw Willow, sitting with her back to a wall, her legs along the ground, breathing hard. Buffy heard her saying over and over again that she 'can't do it, won't do it'. It almost broke her heart to see Willow like that. She also saw Giles next to her, and another girl, helping her do whatever she was going to do. S

She saw herself and Xander running in a large underground cavern where there was lots of fighting. She could see others, other girls, like her, fighting vampires and all kinds of demons. The numbers were overwhelming, and most of all, Buffy saw herself doing things that she wouldn't even be able to think about doing now.

The Visions stopped, and Buffy lay exhausted on the ground. She replayed everything she could see in the visions in her head, until she remembered that the First Slayer was there. She flipped up into a fighting stance and looked around, but there was nothing anywhere. She walked over to where the First Slayer's stakes were and grabbed one.

"What are you afraid of B?" a voice behind her said. Buffy spun around and saw Faith standing in front of the fire, where she had been what seemed like hours ago. "There's nothing here, just little ol' me," Faith said, spreading her arms out to show herself off.

"Why are you here Faith?" Buffy said, not trusting anything, anyone.

"Why are you?" Faith asked back.

"Because I'm **the** Slayer," Buffy replied back.

"What, and I'm not?" Faith asked back again. Buffy still couldn't trust Faith, no matter what. She was still the same manipulative murdering bitch she was back in Sunnydale two and three years ago.

"No, you're not," Buffy replied. She launched herself at Faith, but before she knew what was happening, Faith had swept her legs out from under her, and Buffy was laying on the ground looking up at the sky. She flipped up, ready to face off against Faith again. She threw a punch at her, but Faith blocked it, and with her other hand knocked the stake out of Buffy's grasp. She held onto the arm she'd blocked and grabbed Buffy under the chin and lifted her off the ground.

"Yes. I am," Faith said coldly to Buffy before literally throwing her away. Buffy was on the ground again. She got up again, but Faith was gone. She relaxed a bit, but heard a noise behind the boulders again. Before Buffy could investigate, a figure stepped out from behind the boulders. It was a very familiar figure.

"You don't even know what you are… what's to come… it's only just begun," Tara said.

The end….

Check the Sequel coming out soon

It'll have a title along the lines of "It's the end of the world as we know it" or something like that…. Just check my Author Profile and you'll see it. The reason why I've ended this story and making a sequel is because, well, yea…my train of ideas for this ends around about here, and if you couldn't tell, the last chapter was just a setup for the next story…. Also, I got a very good idea of what to do after watching the finale of Buffy, season 7, and I'm going to incorporate those ideas into the next story… Expect it to be BIGGER than Season 7, but more realistic! And when I mean BIGGER, I mean BIGGER…. BIGGER battles, bigger fight scenes, bigger stakes (As in what the battles are fought for, not as in weapons), yea, and BIGGER everything else too.

Aussie


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